SUMP made in THE LÄND – How Baden-Württemberg in Germany supports the municipal transport transition?

Baden-Württemberg has institutionalised Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) across all municipalities through its legally anchored Climate Mobility Plan (Klimamobilitätsplan). While aligned with the EU SUMP methodology, the approach introduces binding CO₂-reduction targets, mandatory multimodal transport modelling and a robust implementation framework. Municipalities receive extensive support, including 50% state co-funding for plan development and up to 75% for implementation. The state ensures high-quality, comparable mobility plans across cities, municipal associations and districts, through clear legal requirements, financial incentives, a dedicated competence centre and structured monitoring. More than one-quarter of the population is now covered by Climate Mobility Plans.

Context

Baden-Württemberg is one of Germany’s most dynamic and industrialised states, with 11.1 million inhabitants distributed across a polycentric network of medium-sized cities and rural districts. High prosperity and decentralised growth have created substantial transport demand, land take and emissions. This case study was compiled through key documents and information provided by the Ministry of Baden Württemberg.

Transport remains the state’s biggest climate challenge, accounting for 32% of total regional emissions in 2023. The Climate Protection Act sets a legally binding target of reducing transport CO₂ emissions by 55% by 2030 (compared 1990 levels), and full climate neutrality by 2040. Achieving this requires coordinated action by the state and more than 1,100 municipalities, whose planning capacities and resources vary considerably. While the Climate Mobility Plan primarily targets CO₂ reduction, many of the measures promoted, particularly traffic avoidance, modal shift and vehicle electrification, also deliver co-benefits for air quality, including reductions in nitrogen dioxide (NO₂), for which road transport remains a major source.

Baden-Württemberg faces some urbanisation challenges:

• Population growth in many cities
• Suburbanisation and dispersed development, creating high commuter flows beyond municipal borders
• Car dependence in rural and semi-urban areas
• Fragmented planning responsibilities (municipalities, districts, transport associations, regional planning bodies)
• Capacity gaps, especially in smaller municipalities
• A need for uniform planning standards, particularly on climate impact assessments
• The need to advance mobility and energy transitions despite constrained municipal budgets

The Climate Mobility Plan

Individual measures and mode specific planning have proven insufficient to reduce transport emissions, maintaining economic competitiveness and increasing mobility needs in leisure time lead to longer journeys/distances, which counteracts the positive effect. The EU SUMP guidelines provided orientation, but no regional framework existed to ensure coherence across the state. In 2021, the Ministry of Transport therefore developed the Climate Mobility Plan, which follows the EU SUMP cycle (situation analysis, vision building, measure development, implementation planning and monitoring) as depicted in the figure below.

Figure 1 Process for creating a climate mobility plan, climate mobility plans, Kompetenznetz KlimaMobil

The Ministry adapted the approach to the state context through the addition of several elements:

Figure 2 Additional elements introduced to the Climate Mobility Plan approach

Compliance with federal and state law is supported by several mechanisms that secure vertical alignment while preserving local flexibility in measure design.

• A voluntary review of draft plans
• A mandatory review of adopted plans for municipalities seeking higher funding rates (Climate Bonus)
• Funding eligibility tied to adherence to guidelines
• Ongoing cooperation with the regional competence centre (Kompetenznetz Klima Mobil) and regional state authorities (Regierungspräsidien) 

The Kompetenznetz Klima Mobil is a permanent support centre offering free consultations, workshops and training and peer-learning networks. It provides technical guidance on modelling, participation, indicators and monitoring. This complements the Guidelines for Developing Climate Mobility Plans and a Handbook for Transport Modelling.

To support municipalities, municipal associations and districts, the Ministry also established a dedicated Climate Mobility Plan Unit responsible for quality assurance, legal alignment, funding administration and coordination with the competence centre. The unit serves as the primary interface for Municipalities to engage with the Ministry.

For small and medium-sized municipalities (> 50.000 inhabitants), the Ministry developed the “Action Plan for mobility, noise and climate protection”, which follows the SUMP cycle and principles but requires fewer resources than a full Climate Mobility Plan.

Dedicated funding tools

Three state funding instruments are available to support municipalities in developing of the Climate Mobility Plans:

• “Climate bonus”: municipalities implementing Climate Mobility Plans that reach CO₂ targets can obtain 75% funding (instead of 50%) for transport investments.
• “Qualified expert concepts”: 50% co-funding for plan development, including surveys and modelling.

“Funding for staff over 4 years”: 50% co-funding for personnel for four years to support plan development of implementation.

In action

Implementation of Climate Mobility Plans in Baden-Württemberg is characterised by a high level of methodological precision and institutionalisation. Rather than merely recommending the SUMP cycle, the Ministry embedded it in a structured, mandatory process with centralised quality assurance. This responds directly to the challenge of fragmented planning routines and the lack of a coordinating authority at local level. 

Through regional Climate Act (KlimaG BW, paragraph 28) and the Guidelines for Climate Mobility Plans, the Ministry created a multi-level governance system in which municipalities, districts and inter-municipal associations follow a harmonised planning and modelling process while retaining autonomy over local measures^[1]. The Kompetenznetz Klima Mobil functions as a paraprofessional extension of local administrations, helping to translate the methodology into practice, resolve uncertainties, and act as an intermediary between state and local levels.

A central innovation of the Climate Mobility Plan approach is the mandatory multimodal transport model used to calculate CO₂-reduction potential of each measure. This extends classical SUMP methodology by addressing a recurring weakness: insufficient quantification of climate impacts. The modelling makes climate effects visible and comparable, strengthening evidence-based debate^[2]. Municipalities are encouraged to develop three scenarios: 

1. Business as usual (BAU)
2. A framework climate protection scenario (maps measures on DE and EU level)
3. A municipal climate-protection scenario including local measures anchored in the modelling (maps municipal measures)

The method for all three scenarios is described in detail in the Handbook Modelling Climate Mobility Plan. Although the mandatory modelling focuses on CO₂ emissions, several municipalities voluntarily extend the analysis to air pollutants such as NO₂, particularly in view of the stricter EU air quality requirements from 2030 onwards.

Municipalities follow a nine-step process aligned with the SUMP methodology:

1. Establish governance and steering structures
2. Baseline data collection and mobility analysis (including surveys, counts, modelling inputs)
3. Future scenario modelling and climate target definition
4. Model measure packages (avoid–shift–improve)
5. Draft the implementation plan (incl. financing)
6. Public and stakeholder participation
7. Voluntary Ministry review and revision
8. Formal political approval
9. Monitor, based on seven recommended indicators (Annex 20 of the Administrative Regulation of the State Municipal Transport Financing Act) 

A particularly important innovation is the integration of the district level (Landkreise) as a planning entity.  While districts do not fully correspond to the classic Functional Urban Area, existing administrative structures and political bodies (county council) enable them to address inter-municipal issues, and support coordination and data sharing across municipalities. 

While there are no general requirements for implementation of measures, if the municipality or district has received the “climate bonus” then they have the obligation to report on the implementation of key measures with a high climate impact. 

Results

The initiative has already delivered substantive institutional, procedural, and cultural changes. A pilot phase with 6 municipalities (Freiburg im Bresgau, District of Ludwigsburg, Gemeindeverband Mittleres Schussental, City of Heidelberg, City Offenburg, City of Stuttgart) was completed, and 16 other Climate Mobility Plans are currently under development or implementation, covering around 25% of the state’s population. A further eight municipalities have recently begun to prepare a Climate Mobility Plan (known as the “Startklar Kommunen” phase). The City of Heilbronn, recently-announced European Green Capital 2027, will be among these eight new municipalities.

Figure 3 Map of municipalities and districts that are either in the implementation or processing phase of the climate mobility plan, (November 2025) Kompetenznetz KlimaMobil 

Across the pilots, the modelling requirement influenced political and professional cultures by fostering more evidence-based discussions on climate-effective measures. Model results show that effective packages combine push and pull measures, as well as a shift in mobility and drive systems. While all plans share a standardised method, each municipality developed local innovations and different combinations of measures. Experience across the pilots indicates that only diverse measure packages can achieve the required reductions. Action around electrification of public transport (e.g. electric buses), resting traffic (e.g. parking management, traffic calming) and flowing traffic (e.g. speed limits) is particularly impactful, accounting for up to 70% of the reduction of all municipal measures. However, impact varies significantly between measures. This demonstrates that there is no one-size-fits-all approach, and local adaptation remains essential. The average CO₂-reduction potential is around 230,000 tons in 2030 per plan. 

At district level, the Climate Mobility Plan has encouraged data sharing, alignment of objectives and coordination of measures, which rarely occurred before. Within the administration, it has improved cooperation between departments.

Across municipalities, municipal associations and districts, the Climate Mobility Planstrengthened the role of climate protection as a central principle of mobility planning. CO₂-reduction is no longer a supplementary chapter but the framework for decision-making. Municipalities noted that visualising the emissions gap between current trajectories and required reductions has had strong political effects, enabling more ambitious decisions.

Challenges, opportunities and transferability

The implementation of Climate Mobility Plans in Baden-Württemberg has occurred within a complex governance landscape, and the pilot phase revealed structural challenges that mirror broader mobility-transition issues. At the same time, the process has created opportunities for strategic, methodological and cultural change. Experience shows that Climate Mobility Plans require effort but deliver meaningful change in both urban and in rural areas.

Key challenges for transferability include:

1. Administrative boundaries that do not reflect functional mobility realities: District borders often do not align with functional mobility areas. Pilot municipalities noted that while the district-level framework created new coordination structures, it was not always congruent with daily mobility patterns (e.g. commuting), resulting in blind spots or overlaps. 

2. Planning capacity and administrative readiness vary with city size: While larger cities may have existing transport models, well-developed mobility concepts, and experienced teams, smaller municipalities often lack resources and rely on support. The “Action Plan for Mobility, Noise and Climate Protection” was developed as a streamlined version of the Climate Mobility Plan, adjusted to small and medium-sized cities

3. Cooperation between municipal and regional actors is both a success factor and a challenge: Intermunicipal and multilevel measures are necessary to effectively address traffic interconnections and promote a shared planning culture. At the same time, efforts are required to coordinate and conduct planning and political consultations with the number of municipalities involved.

4. Every political level must play its part: The measures taken so far on the municipal level have helped to make progress. However, additional, ambitious local measures are needed to meet climate targets. Further, additional measures on higher political levels (EU, national government, state government) are necessary that climate goals can be achieved on the local level. All political levels must play their part. Climate protection is a joint responsibility. Modelling results show that around a quarter of necessary emission reductions can be achieved with local measures, another quarter with measures on state-level and the other half by measures on national and EU level.

5. Financing the expansion of sustainable transport remains a challenge: The expansion of infrastructure (one-time financing) and the operation and maintenance (continuous financing) of new services generate substantial costs. New sources of revenue are required, such as mobility passes, to continue supporting such investments. 

6. Political sensitivities around climate-relevant ‘push’ measures: Even with strong evidence, political resistance persists towards measures such as parking-space reallocation or speed-limit adjustments. Modelling helps depoliticise debates, but implementation requires strong political leadership, communication and engagement strategies.

7. Managing the complexity of cross-sector coordination: Mobility and climate mitigation intersect with land-use, air quality, energy, digitalisation and public health. Aligning Climate Mobility Plans with existing climate strategies or plans requires substantial internal coordination and sometimes re-negotiation of responsibilities. This reflects a broader governance challenge that administrative systems comprise many layers with relatively high autonomy, making horizontal and vertical alignment demanding but essential.

In depth

[1] https://www.landesrecht-bw.de/bsbw/document/jlr-KlimaSchGBW2023rahmen  

[2] Rickel, P. C. (2025). Klimamobilitätsplan – Instrument für die Mobilitätswende Eine Fallstudie zu den Pilotkommunen in Baden-Württemberg [Diploma Thesis, Technische Universität Wien]. reposiTUm. https://doi.org/10.34726/hss.2025.135542

Kompetenznetz KlimaMobil: https://www.klimaschutz-bewegt.de/  

Climate Mobility Plans Guidelines: https://www.klimaschutz-bewegt.de/wp-content/uploads/Leitfaden_Klimamobilitaetsplaene.pdf

Climate Act Baden-Württemberg : https://um.baden-wuerttemberg.de/de/klima-energie/klimaschutz/klimagesetz-baden-wuerttemberg

Handbook Modelling Climate Mobility Plan: https://www.klimaschutz-bewegt.de/wp-content/uploads/231012_Klimamobilitaetsplaene_HandbuchModellierung_V0.1_barrierefrei.pdfhttps://www.klimaschutz-bewegt.de/

Authors: Morgane Juliat and Dr. Susanne Böhler-Bädeker 

Views and opinions expressed are those of the author(s) and do not reflect those of the European Commission. 

Photo credits © Frank Gaertner, Kompetenznetz KlimaMobil , Sina Ettmer Photography