On May 14, 2021 representatives of Lviv in Ukraine and the expert Dr. Haris Piplas met virtually to discuss a pilot project of an E-Mobility Hub being developed by the City Institute and municipal authority of Lviv, Ukraine.  The envisioned E-Mobility Hub at the intersection of the Bandery and Chuprynky streets will become an inclusive public space invoking economic and social change in the everyday life of its citizens. The envisioned Hub captures vital aspects needed for the behavioral shift. City representatives have taken into account user-friendliness, safety, lighting as well as visual and digital prospects when developing the project. The goal is to achieve major public engagement and later replicability of hubs onto the whole city map.

 As this will be the pilot project with high stakes, city representatives were cautioned by the expert to cover all necessary grounds of contextualizing Hubs into city architecture by superimposing them onto existing infrastructure. Working closely into city planning as well as considering the agenda of street reconstructions in Lviv could lead to identification of possible spots for Mobility Hubs.  Tying in all above mentioned groundwork will simplify reproducibility of the project.

Institutional vision has been identified as another discussion topic during the meeting. Projects as such need integration of development banks as well as involvement of variety of partners to succeed and later scale up the project in the future. Dr. Haris Piplas advised project team to start by raising social awareness about the project first as citizens will aid in advocating for the project, when it will be presented to local or international funding institutions.  Success of this pilot project will act as a springboard to development of other Hubs.

Presentations:

Bandery – Chuprynky Hub Sketch project.     Ms. Olena Kuzhym, Investment Unit, City Institute, Lviv, Ukraine

Mobility Hubs as inclusive urban public spaces and sustainable economic catalysts Dr. Haris Piplas, Co-Director, Integrated Urban Solutions, Drees & Sommer Switzerland

Programme

This virtual event was moderated by Dr. Irakli Samkharadze, Regional Coordinator, Connective Cities, GIZ who introduced the participants of the meeting and gave floor to Ms. Olena Kuzhym, representative of Lviv city to display their sketch project and further elaborate on work being done. Virtual meeting featured two representatives of GIZ Ukrainian office representatives giving their suggestions and recommendations along the way.

Results

The expert talk was concluded with Mr. Maksym Terletsky, Deputy Director, City Institute, Lviv, Ukraine, highlighting some of the major takeaways that they will be further integrating into their project. At the same time, he emphasized that meetings of such kind as well as close cooperation will be inevitably essential. Ms. Marta Pastukh, project manager of Ukrainian-German cooperation project, “Municipal Development and Rehabilitation of the Old City of Lviv” and Mr. Terletsky agreed that their local cooperation will also continue and aid the project. Support proposition was also extended by Mr. Armin Wagner, head of the Sector Project “Sustainable Mobility” at GIZ.