Problems and purposes
The Municipality of Perugia intends to adopt an Urban Sustainable Mobility Plan (PUMS) defined by the European Eltis guidelines as a medium-long term strategic plan (ten-year time horizon) aimed at promoting a mobility system capable of guaranteeing travel needs. of citizens in different social, physical and biological conditions (of age), to reduce pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption while simultaneously increasing the efficiency and economy of transporting people and goods, as well as attractiveness and quality of life and urban environment (Link 1).
History and geography
The Umbrian capital is a historic city lying on a hill, in a central position with respect to the fertile plains of the Valle di Chiana and the Valle del Tevere Umbria. After the war it saw a rapid and gradual demographic growth, passing from 95,310 inhabitants in 1951 to 173,000 today (July 2017) of which over 20,000 foreigners (about 12%). Its historical and artistic heritage attracts many tourists, as do the University offices and other educational and administrative institutes. Equally attractive is the food sector where the Perugina plant and many medium and small craft and service companies are located. Its altimetric conformation (above 400 msl) and the dispersion of its historical and more recent hamlets, its medieval urban structures, and the excessively optimistic management of the past, have generated a mobility that is too centered on the car with 70.26 cars each 100 inhabitants (Municipality, 2017i, p. 41), with 72.9% of travel by car, compared to 14% of public transport and 10% on foot (Ib, p. 40). The data on PM10 pollution are also higher than the tolerable limit for 36 days a year.
In local politics there was a surprise change of tradition in 2014. Since 1995 the city has been governed by the center-left, up to the mayor Wladimiro Boccali. In 2014 in the first round, Boccali, with a broad coalition of center-left, took 46.5% of the votes and the center-right reached 26%, the 5 Star Movement, in strong growth compared to the previous administrative offices of 2009, took 16,225 votes (19.08%). In the second round, however, Boccali counts only 25,666 of his 39,582 votes, while Romizi, the center-right candidate, wins, overtaking Boccali with 35,469 votes (58%). In Boccali's program, participation occurs as a generic term or as "forms of participation and comparison at no cost but capable of empowering citizens and broadening their choices and administrative action" [...] "like neighborhood consultations" [2]. In Romizi's program the theme of participation recurs even less and in a generic way. One of the last 15 chapters of the program is dedicated to the topic of mobility. The arguments go into the merits of the issues, there is no mention of participation in the definition of the plan. The minimetrò is criticized, an infrastructure that is not economically profitable and that has created other problems for other collective services [3].
The requirement of participation in the drafting of the plans comes from the European directives but it is the task of the planners and local administrations to decline that generic request for participation and sharing of the plan in an effective way.
Promoters and lenders
Municipality of Perugia. Mobility and infrastructure sector . The owner of the mobility plan and sole financier.
TPS Pro transport engineering based in Perugia and Bologna is in charge of the design of the road infrastructure.
Go-Mobility of Rome, is an engineering company for traffic measurement, simulation and design of mobility solutions.
Higher Institute of Training and Research for Transport (ISFOR) in Rome is a research institute created in 1994 by the Banca Nazionale delle Comunicazioni Foundation - current majority shareholder - and by the State Railways, to contribute to the renewal of the mobility sector for people and goods; carries out research, consultancy and training.
The financial entity of the process is not indicated.
Selection of participants
Preparation phase . Interviews with qualified witnesses were carried out but it is not clear whether these witnesses are the group leaders of the city councilors (12 groups) and have been called to a joint discussion table. In the methodological document (Municipality, 2017g) there is a list-mapping of the actors invited to the tables (Ib., P. 6), which should coincide with the privileged witnesses but the actual ones are not indicated, therefore it is not clear whether in the list there are only the guests or the actual present; 7 tables for some homogeneous categories of actors (majority councilors, council groups, organizations, mobility, businesses and commerce, resident associations, associations and professions). There are photos in which the presence is nourished and the list-mapping of the actors invited to each table, but since there were no minutes it was not possible to detect the actual attendance (Link 1 - Documents). However, the communications for each individual actor sent in written form by e-mail following the discussions in the tables (through their reading it is possible to learn that they took place in April 2017) are reported both independently through the address displayed in the pages of the municipal site. There are 15 communications from the actors who present themselves as Position papers (including FIAB Umbria, Legambiente Umbria, Italian Union of the Blind and Visually Impaired, Coop Taxi Drivers of Perugia, BICO Bici Corriere, Minimetrò, Old Town Association Table, University Left, Italia Nostra, Engineers of the Province of Perugia) and half a dozen proposals from citizens (Link 1 - Documents).
Online questionnaire campaign . "The employees of the companies in the Sant'Andrea delel Fratte area - the largest industrial area in Perugia - were asked to fill in the questionnaire aimed at investigating home-work habits" (Link 1 - On-line survey) . 723 users connected to the link to fill in a google questionnaire of which detailed data of the sample are available (eg 52% men; 47.4% women); 67% employed; 33% not employed; 82% resident, 18% domiciled, and so on. In addition, the starting areas were indicated among: other municipalities (110); periphery (209); semi-center (191) and center (213). The survey is not given as it begins but ends on 9/8/17.
Meetings with experts and actors . 4 discussion tables were held, which saw the participation of about 40 stakeholders representing over 30 between Bodies and Associations.
Presentation conference . The main results of the online survey on citizens and stakeholder discussion tables were presented. The Conference took place during the European Mobility Week on 22 September 2017. The institutional actors, experts, actors who participated in the tables were present [1]. Attendance is not reported (Link 1 - Participatory process).
Focus on local interventions . Three days of public meetings were organized on 5 localized critical nodes; for the first one, carried out in the hamlet of Ponte San Giovanni, was open to the public with registration at the entrance, it saw the presence of the Mayor A. Romizi, the Councilor for mobility C. Casaioli, the expert of TPS Pro S. Ciurnelli, the person in charge of the procedure and manager of the mobility and infrastructure sector L. Naldini. The meeting was moderated by the expert from Isfort, Luca Trepiedi. In the subsequent meetings of mid-November 2017, in addition to the presence of these figures, academic experts, administrators or experts with experiences from other cities were among the speakers. There are no reports on the number of attendees of the public and of the actors (Link 1 - Participatory process).
Methods and Tools
Structured dialogue between stakeholders . "In the construction of the PUMS of Perugia, a procedure defined" structured dialogue between stakeholders "is used which provides for the combination of tools for comparison and evaluation of the alternatives that can be identified as" priorities "among the general objectives of the PUMS" (Link 1 - Participatory process) . The structuring of the dialogue followed by the designers starts with a listening phase as aggregated as possible, without the use of methods that deal with mediation between the parties (in fact the tables have been divided by homogenous category, as well as the online questionnaire) without comparing interests and positions. First, all the items are recorded separately (with questionnaires and focus groups with homogeneous categories ). In a second phase, the priorities as ordered by the separate surveys are compared, in discussion tables with actors of mixed composition, with a priority order already outlined by the survey on citizens and on which to start a discussion "aimed at defining, through the '' multi-criteria analysis, the final ranking of the objectives, as well as to identify a set of result indicators and monitoring of the objectives themselves (Municipality, 2017g, p. 7).
Public meetings . These are the classic public meetings with a pre-established program in which interventions by institutional figures and experts take place for an hour and a half or two, leaving at the end the last 15 minutes, half an hour, to the interventions of the public and the conclusions of the 'councilor delegated to the issue.
Deliberation, decisions and interaction with the public
Preparatory activity . The process was started with "an intense process of preliminary consultation of citizenship on the fundamental objectives which then led to the drafting of the tender documents" (Link 1 - Preparatory activity) for the assignment of the investigation and planning activities for the purposes of its implementation. However, the dates of this start are not available, but the public presentation in slides (without date) illustrating the phases and objectives of the plan and the special reference specifications for the designers (Ib.). The position papers sent by the actors are available from the “intense preliminary consultation process” (Link 1 - Documents) but not the minutes of the meetings.
SUMP scheme . It took place in two periods (the dates of which are not available). A preliminary one with interviews with privileged witnesses led to the preliminary version of the outline of the objectives of the SUMP. The contents are divided into "dimensions of urban mobility" and "objectives of policies for sustainable urban mobility, with examples of possible interventions". The dimensions are: Accessibility, Liveability, Environmental Sustainability and Economic Sustainability. For example on Accessibility we find among the objectives of the policies with the related examples: a) to increase alternatives to mobility (to network all services for citizens and businesses, teleworking, co-working, expanding the municipal wi-fi network, encouraging e-commerce, proximity trade and zero km products; b) facilitate travel by non-motorized vehicles (network of cycle paths, improvement of sidewalks, increase in pedestrian areas, zones 30 and 20km / h, removal of architectural barriers, school foot bus, bike-to-work, bike sharing, etc ...); c) integrate and optimize travel by public and private transport by making better use of existing infrastructures; d) strengthen the TPL (local public transport) at the service of industrial areas, educational and commercial centers located in peripheral areas, as well as in the historic center (shuttle services with call for students, enhancement of TPL night services, metro-bus service on the main axes of access, timetable, tariff integration between the various systems, etc.); and so on, with 5-7 objectives (with various examples) for each of the 4 dimensions. The final version of this scheme was consolidated after 7 meetings with actors belonging to the following homogeneous categories: majority directors, council groups, entities, mobility, businesses and commerce, resident associations, associations and professions. There are no minutes but only the scheme in its final version (Municipality of Perugia, 2017a).
Survey with on-line questionnaire aimed at citizens . The scheme was used as a framework to set the questions on the on-line questionnaire addressed to a sample of individuals, resident or domiciled around the Perugian fraction of Sant'Andrea delle Fratte, the production-commercial area they go to. It is not known how this campaign was promoted, what forms of communication and contact were used. It is said that company employees were asked to fill in the questionnaire, but from the results it seems that they in turn could flood the sample by involving friends and family because a large number of "unemployed" took part in the survey (237, the 33%). The survey ends on 9/8/17 and the document with the quantitative results is available, with the prioritization of the objectives in absolute terms, for each dimension and for each social category (Municipality of Perugia, 2017b) and qualitative results, with the answers to the open questions (Municipality of Perugia, 2017c).
The objectives that emerge above all are: 1) Strengthen the LPT at the service of industrial areas, educational centers, attraction centers located in peripheral areas and in the vast area; 2) Reduce the emissions of pollutants into the atmosphere (PM10, CO2, etc.) generated by transport; 3) Adaptation of the bus fleet and mobility infrastructures in general to the needs of users with permanent or temporary reduced mobility; all the others follow. Then rankings are provided with respect to each category. For example, the first objective of the overall aggregate is the same for the categories relating to the location of the residence / domicile (center, semi-center, suburbs, other municipalities); The same also for students, while for the over 55s the first objective is "Strengthen and innovate the role of rail transport in the urban and large area" and what was first for the others "Strengthen LPT" goes to fifth place (Municipality, 2017b).
Meeting with stakeholders . The definitive scheme was questioned with the actors "in 4 discussion tables that saw the participation of about 40 stakeholders representing over 30 between Bodies and Associations" (Link 1 - Participatory process). In this session the tables focused on one of the dimensions of mobility (the most liveable city, the most accessible city, the least polluted city, the least expensive transport); the actors have arranged themselves according to their own interests in an autonomous way. The summary document is dated 20/9/17 (Municipality, 2017d). The comparison between citizens' priorities and those of the actors do not combine perfectly but approach and complement each other. The first priority of citizens for the actors is in second place, while in the first we find the improvement "of the efficiency of public transport and the governance of the mobility system", furthermore in the third place, not present in the first 5 objectives of the citizens, we find the reduction of “land consumption caused by the expansion of the city” (Municipality, 2017d). From the synthesis of the curators what may appear a contradiction emerged, namely that citizens want a more livable city (less polluted) and do not want to give more attention to the car than they already have, they do not demonize it, but they are not much inclined to "increase the spaces free from motorized vehicles", putting this goal in 16th place. According to the summary of the editors, this can be done but only "on a general agreement assuming the responsibilities of the various actors (supply and demand) and practicing as much as possible" method "innovations that we have started experimenting in recent months" (Municipality, 2017h, p. 13-14). The use of multi-criteria analysis or result indicators or monitoring was not detected as required by the methodological purpose (Municipality, 2017g, p.7).
Conference to present the results of the survey on the priorities of citizens and actors. It took place on the occasion of the European Week of Sustainable Mobility, on 22/9/17, in which the results achieved were presented. Present were the authorities, the Director of the "Government of the territory and landscape" sector of the Umbria Region, the expert technicians of the design staff, expert guests from other public and private experiences, representatives of actors who had participated in the phase carried out [1] .
Focus on local interventions . "The participatory procedure will be applied not only to the 'general' case of defining the priorities of the PUMS, but also to 3 local situations in which the feasibility of three specific interventions of mobility. The focuses will be identified within 5 historicized critical nodes of the city. Some details are available on the focus relating to the connection Pieve di Campo - via Volumnia (town of Ponte San Giovanni), on the identification of an infrastructural corridor in continuity and in line with the road interventions recently carried out by the Municipal Administration. The meeting, always carried out in the manner of public meetings (see above, Methods and tools) was organized on 17/11 from 16:30 to 20:00 at the CVA in the hamlet of Ponte S. Giovanni. On this occasion, a study is also illustrated on the surveys of displacements and design hypotheses such as the introduction of a Tram-Train that partially exploits the existing railway lines, with path and cost hypotheses (Municipality, 2017e). There are no reports on the number and nature of participants nor the content of any public interventions.
Another couple of these meetings are held on 27/11 at the Oratory of S. Antonio Abate in Corso Bersaglieri in the center of Perugia. The first talks about Urban access restrictions and the second about home-school trips. The scheme is that of public meetings; the presentation slides of the experts are available but no reports on the public and its reactions (Link 1 - Participatory process). The presentation also illustrates the result of the survey on schools in the Corso Bersaglieri area, with interviews with 3 preschools and 1 middle school, on home-school travel. The on-line questionnaire was administered to 23% of the parents of children in kindergartens and to 44% of pupils over the age of 14 in middle school. There are no absolute numbers but only percentages. Questions were asked about how children accompany them to school (54% drive), the perception of danger and the various types (eg high traffic is the main one). In addition, alternative and sustainable methods were investigated, with questions of desirability and willingness to collaborate, such as the school public transport service, car-pooling, cycling, the piedibus, the kiss & ride, all alternatives that met with relative positive feedback and many other data (Municipality, 2017f).
The site is updated on 6/12/17 (ril. 15/2/18) and does not provide further information. The SUMP should still be in process.
Influence, results and effects
It is not possible to establish the influence on the definitive PUMS at the moment, but given the path, strongly structured and followed by public administrators and competent technicians, it is completely consistent with the analyzes and objectives that emerged. No particular conflicts have been highlighted or at least they are not given by what is available on the official website. The use of multi-criteria tools, or result indicators, or the monitoring of objectives was not noted.
Analysis and lessons learned
At the moment, the communication of the path is lacking as regards the principle of transparency on the following aspects, cost of the participatory path and of the overall assignment entrusted to the designers and on documentary aspects (minutes of the tables), absence of declared tools such as analysis multi-criteria and the set of result indicators and goal monitoring.
It seems that the preparatory and construction phases of the PUMS objectives scheme carried out an implicit phase of sharing the path with the actors and led to a sufficiently representative synthesis of objectives, given the over 700 questionnaires filled out by the sample of citizens. The punctual interventions in critical areas have played an important function of detailed arrangement but here too there are shortcomings in transparency and in reality little dialogue but, from the way the public meetings are set up, a lot of unilateral, techno-optimistic and persuasive communication. Regarding the level of inclusiveness, there is no evidence regarding the foreign population, while on disabilities, among the actors, there was an association that protects the interests of blind and visually impaired people.
Secondary sources
Municipality of Perugia (2017a), PUMS, Version 1 of the plan outline, set of thematic objectives> http://www.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/04_ObiivaliTematici-1.pdf (ril. 15/2/18 ).
Municipality of Perugia (2017b), PUMS, Thematic objectives of the new PUMS: citizens' opinion, 9/8> http://www.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/08_Indagine-ObiettiveTematici.pdf (ril. 15 / 2/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017c), PUMS, The contributions to the PUMS, Suggestions collected during the online survey aimed at citizens on the thematic objectives of the PUMS, 13/7> http://www.comune.perugia.it/resources/ SUMP / 12_IndagineOnLine_Suggerimenti.pdf (release 15/2/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017d), PUMS, Thematic objectives of the new Urban Sustainable Mobility Plan of Perugia: the opinion of the stakeholders, 20/9>http://www.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/09_ValutationStakeholder.pdf (release 15/2/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017e), PUMS, Mobility and accessibility of the urban quadrant of Ponte San Giovanni: from criticalities to opportunities, 17/11/17> http://www.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/27_PonteSanGiovanni_17-11 -2017.pdf (release 15/2/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017f), PUMS, The results of the survey on school trips in the historicized critical node of Corso Bersaglieri - Porta Pesa, 27/11> http://www.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/34_Presiamento_IndaginiScuole_27 -11-2017.pdf (release 15/2/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017g), PUMS, The method of "structured dialogue between stakeholders", 4/5> http://istituzionale.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/05_Dialogo-Strutturato-PUMS_Perugia.pdf (ril. 15 / 2/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017h), PUMS, Citizens' consultation as an orientation tool for the plan - results report, 22/9> http://istituzionale.comune.perugia.it/RESOURCES/pums/15_1Convegno_Obiiettives.pdf (ril. 2/15/18).
Municipality of Perugia (2017i), PUMS, Report, 12/9> http://istituzionale.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/10_Report.pdf (ril. 15/2/18).
Link
- SUMP Urban Sustainable Mobility Plan> http://www.comune.perugia.it/pagine/piano-urbano-della-mobilita-sostenibile (ril. 15/2/18).
Note
[1] Municipality of Perugia, What mobility for the Municipality of Perugia, the Urban Plan of Sustainable Mobility, first results, I agree, 22 September, Friday at 15: 00/19: 00, Sala del Consiglio Comunale, Meeting room>http: //www.comune.perugia.it/resources/PUMS/13_Programma_ConvegnoPUMS.pdf (release 15/2/18).
[2] Electoral program of the Democratic Party of Perugia, Administrative elections 25 May 2014, p. 16> http://www.pdperugia.it/installation_blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Programma-Pd-Perugia.pdf (release 15/2/18).
[3] Program guidelines of mandate of the mayor Andrea Romizi> http://istituzionale.comune.perugia.it/resources/Sindaco/lineeProgrammaticheSindacoRomizi.pdf (ril. 15/2/18).