FrankfurtRheinMain on the move: first SUMP for the Region

With a unanimous decision, the Regional Authority FrankfurtRheinMain adopted its first SUMP for the FrankfurtRheinMain Region at the end of 2020. The plan provides a concrete roadmap for the transition to a more sustainable, efficient and reliable mobility system in one of Europe’s hearts for production, trade, finance and, of course, transport. Given the complex mobility challenges in this polycentric region, the SUMP principles are applied to the greater functional transport area in FrankfurtRheinMain, covering not only the major cities of Frankfurt and Offenbach, but also six surrounding counties with altogether over 2.7 million inhabitants.

The long-term goal of the SUMP foresees an increase in sustainable modes of transport up to 65% by 2030, helping to reach the EU climate goal of reducing CO2 emissions by 55% by the same year. FrankfurtRheinMain is to become a “5-Minute-Region”, which means that a sustainable mobility option can be reached within a five-minute walk from every place where people live. This vision will be supported by the core principles of “avoiding unnecessary transport”, “plan necessary transport” and “secure mobility for all”.

Given the complex structure of competences in the field, the integrated and multimodal FrankfurtRheinMain SUMP is built on existing sectoral or local mobility plans and puts a strong accent on concrete measures. The 19 core initiatives of the SUMP have been derived from a status quo analysis, developed in physical and online participation of residents and agreed on with the different regional and local stakeholders.

The main fields of work will be realising an integrated cycleway network and a regional network of multimodal mobility hubs, as well as enhancing pedestrian traffic. Moreover, the SUMP focusses on rail-centred community developments, a strong needs-based public transport, integrated commercial traffic and a better managed mobility and transport transition. These priorities contain lighthouse projects like the construction of cycle highways or a rail ring around Frankfurt, a “rail coach” for the reactivation of previously given-up connections, fostering public on-demand solutions for the wider region, introducing express bus lines and developing urban cableways.

In the course of the first two and a half years of planning and consultation, the FrankfurtRheinMain Regional Authority also developed a new mobility department. Its task is to ensure that the measures within its authority can be realised as well as to organise regional cooperation, so that the other aspects of the SUMP can be tackled too. With this approach, a more effective multimodal regional mobility governance will be ensured, as well as a better linkage of transport with land-use planning and broader regional development strategies. Widening the SUMP’s scope of action on the peri-urban area thereby consciously aims at targeting existing problems like noise or air pollution at its roots while preventing urban-rural mobility trade-offs.

Download the full SUMP here. For more information on FrankfurtRheinMain's mobility strategy see here.