The City of Ljubljana is presenting its Comprehensive Transport Strategy, a strategic document emphasising measures for the promotion of sustainable mobility in Ljubljana which, together with the action plan for its implementation, is to be discussed at the June session of the City Council of the City of Ljubljana.

The strategy, which we have been preparing for the past six months in cooperation with different stakeholders and the wider public, is building upon the Transport Policy of the City of Ljubljana, adopted in 2012, based on the Ljubljana Vision 2025. The Comprehensive Transport Strategy and its implementation action plan are to be discussed at the June session of the City Council of the City of Ljubljana, and then the adopted and confirmed strategic document is going to serve as the basis for the acquisition of European grants earmarked in future tenders for measures in the field of sustainable mobility.

We set out to form the Comprehensive Transport Strategy as a continuation of the implementation of established goals and based it on common platforms and procedures applicable for all Slovenian municipalities. Together with all key stakeholders we focused on long-term sustainable transport planning and in cooperation with operators, the Urban Institute of Ljubljana (LUZ d.d.) and the Regional Development Agency of the Ljubljana Urban Region (RDA LUR), we developed the Comprehensive Transport Strategy of the City of Ljubljana. The upgrade of the content of the Transport Policy of the City of Ljubljana can be seen mostly in the emphasis on green city policy, strategic inclusion of electric mobility, new defined key goals and measures for their attainment.

Although we worked together with the stakeholders and the citizens of Ljubljana already when we were planning the Transport Policy of the City of Ljubljana, we payed special attention to the comprehensive inclusion of the public in the creation of the Comprehensive Transport Strategy of the City of Ljubljana. Colleagues in departments and offices of the city administration, public institutes and companies of the City of Ljubljana as well as representatives of district communities and numerous citizens and visitors to Ljubljana were also actively involved in its preparation.

Their response exceeded our expectations, namely, we received over 1600 proposals for traffic improvements and took them into account according to their feasibility in the strategic document.

The basic goal of the Transport Policy of the City of Ljubljana was also updated, that is, that until 2020 one third of journeys should be made on foot or by bicycle, one third by public transport and one third by private cars. And so the Comprehensive Transport Strategy of the City of Ljubljana envisages that until 2027 two thirds of journeys are going to be completed in a sustainable way – on foot, by bicycle or by public passenger transport and only one third by private cars. Namely, we have already exceeded some initially set goals: there has been a high increase of the share of journeys made on foot and by bicycle on the account of those made by private cars.

Within the preparation procedure of the Comprehensive Transport Strategy of the City of Ljubljana we also carried out a three-part survey to gather information on the opinions and wishes with regard to managing all types of traffic (walking, cycling, public, car and still traffic). As the survey was done online and it was fairly short, we were also able to include in the formation of the comprehensive transport strategy those individuals who would perhaps otherwise not take part in more time-consuming participative practices, such as public discussions in district communities of the City of Ljubljana, but would still like to express their wishes and opinions with regard to mobility in Ljubljana. As we were able to include 750 individuals in the process through the survey we regard the collected data as important and useful influencing the selection of goals and measures incorporated in the Comprehensive Transport Strategy of the City of Ljubljana. From the survey we can conclude that the support for the concept of sustainable traffic management is high. The analysis shows that among different types of mobility the main emphasis was on the improvement of the conditions for cyclists and cycling infrastructure inside and outside the city centre.

Detailed results of the survey are published on the Comprehensive Transport Strategy website.