13th Florence Intermodal Forum: Urban Nodes Along the Trans-European Transport Network

The 13th Florence Intermodal Forum, organised by the Transport Area of the Florence School of Regulation in collaboration with the European Commission – DG MOVE, will gather European and national- regulators, public transport operators, industry representatives and academics for a discussion on the challenges and enablers when discussing urban nodes.

The event is to take place 14 June 2024 from 09:00-17:00 CEST in Florence, Italy. 

What are the specific issues to be addressed?

Many stakeholders in these urban nodes are newcomers in the TEN-T world. This means that they will have to be integrated to work on a functioning network. Therefore, urban nodes are also a means to establish and reinforce the links between key stakeholders and the specific transport policy roles: national ministries in charge of long-distance transport, cities, local and regional authorities in charge of urban mobility and of transport, public transport operators, rail operators, logistics companies, urban planners, and others more.

The challenge is that work at the level of urban nodes is just about to start. There are no common coordination principles to implement the objectives of the TEN-T policy for urban nodes so far, not to mention the fact that there is often a misunderstanding of what urban nodes are: are they entities within cities, cities themselves, so-called “functional cities”, metropolitan areas or something else? Facilitating the establishment of a local set-up that allows for coordination/interaction between these stakeholders is therefore vital, not to mention the fact that the definition of an urban node and its governance are of course closely linked.

This 13th Intermodal Forum will discuss the question of the coordination of urban nodes: What would be appropriate, basic and commonly agreed mechanisms? Who could/should be in charge of coordinating and representing the stakeholders of an urban node? Is there a one-size-fits-all structure or at least some common principles? What options could be envisaged?