GOAL
The Bergamo Mobile project has a dual objective: to analyze smart mobility planning/management tools and to understand residents’ needs through the application of participatory techniques. The research was structured around two integrated and mutually influential areas:
– Smart Mobility Planning: aimed at analyzing and identifying intelligent planning tools for mobility, starting from exemplary international case studies, in order to provide a vision of the urban context of Bergamo and highlight the trans-scalar connections between the urban and extra-urban systems;
– Spatial Capital/Governance: aimed at identifying spatial capital, understood as the set of skills and experiences that individuals — whether residents or city users — possess regarding the places they move through. This capital can be recovered and enhanced as a resource in territorial governance through participatory mapping systems and processes.

RESEARCH AREA DESCRIPTION
As part of the Bergamo 2.(035) project, the research was structured around a theoretical-methodological approach grounded in the concept of globalization and strongly focused on the relationship between spatial capital and territorial governance.
These key concepts help define a new interpretation of mobility, not solely as the movement of people, goods, and information through space, but rather as something closely linked to accessibility — the set of opportunities available to individuals and goods for movement.
By basing planning on citizens’ needs related to access to places and services, it becomes possible to identify new mobility solutions, as well as alternatives to movement itself and the expansion of related transportation infrastructure.

This approach shifts away from a strictly technology-based view of “smartness” — centered only on the expansion and diffusion of ICT (Information and Communication Technologies) — and instead focuses on the intelligence of the urban environment. The project proposes analyses and design perspectives aimed at involving various territorial actors (institutional, associative, private, etc.) in all phases of the research. The research activities included:
– Analysis of planning tools and the local context;
– Comparison with international experiences of medium-sized cities comparable to Bergamo;
– Participatory action research activities: interviews, focus groups, and an online questionnaire;
– The Bergamo Mobility Table 2.(035);
– Creation of cartographic tools (Mobility Mapping).

RESULTS AND PROPOSALS
From the discussions held within the Bergamo Mobility Table 2.(035), several proposals emerged to address the main mobility challenges in Bergamo. These can be summarized in three areas:
– Institutional: the limited impact of political and managerial decisions;
– Communicative/Design: the unsustainability of traditional mobility choices and the consequent need for a “change of mindset”;
– Infrastructural: the fragmentation of pedestrian and cycling routes, traffic congestion, and limited intermodality.
Aware that a single and definitive solution for sustainable mobility does not exist, but with the desire to turn reflections into concrete actions, the research team proposed addressing these challenges through the following intervention strategies, taking into account the initiatives put forward by various stakeholders in recent years and leveraging their spatial capital:
• Institutional level: participation in the local public transport conference and the CIVITAS – CIVINET network, in order to make the Mobility Table a permanent, broader, and institutionalized platform. This would support ongoing multiscale discussions on mobility, enabling both local/regional and European-level dialogue.
• Communicative/Design level: development of smart, map-based tools for mobility information (infomobility); continuation of data collection and sharing through strengthened participatory processes; creation of a network of fixed and mobile sensors to monitor mobility and service accessibility; further development of Mobility Mapping as a map-based open data platform for real-time information sharing and collection, as well as for integrating the perspectives of local actors.
• Infrastructural level: implementation of sustainable mobility pilot projects aimed at reconnecting fragmented urban spaces and increasing areas for social interaction, starting from neighborhood-centered planning. This includes promoting alternatives to private car use through incentives for clean technologies and shared transport (e.g., neighborhood-based car sharing), and adopting Europe-oriented initiatives to position the city as a national and international model for similarly sized urban areas.

RESEARCH TEAM
Fulvio Adobati (Associate Professor UNIBG)
Federica Burini (Associate Professor UNIBG)
Alessandra Ghisalberti (Adjunct Professor UNIBG)
Margherita Cisani (Research assistant UNIBG)

View the project: Urban Mobility 2015/16