Live-meeting in Santo Tirso and awe-inspiring Pontevedra

Exchange and learning in Santo Tirso

On the first day we met at the premises of the city’s International Museum of Contemporary Sculpture (http://miec.cm-stirso.pt/en/museum-background/). The meeting started with a welcome address from Santo Tirso’s mayor, Alberto Costa. Afterwards, we had presentations about Santo Tirso’s mobility challenges and plans, showing the basis of what is to become the future Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan. In the best-practices sharing session, we showed two cases: 1) Santo Tirso’s experience of open street events (Viva a Rua, our Small Scale Action which we will describe in detail on another post), and 2) Aveiro’s grassroots project of open streets for kids, playing and conviviality. 

The project “Kit-Our Street” (https://www.facebook.com/kitanossarua/ ) won a municipal participatory budget in Aveiro. The idea comes from the memories of how easy, normal and safe it used to be for children and youth to play outside in the streets. This project aims to enable that and consists of an electric cargo bike, which carries the “kit”: a vast collection of games, painting materials, balls, some fake grass, and other street furniture. This kit can turn every boring asphalted street quickly into a lively space full of children and adults running around, playing, and experimenting. The idea is that anyone 1) could talk to neighbours about the idea of closing their street to traffic for a day, or half a day,  2) make the request to the municipality, and 3) on the day itself, simply go pick-up the e-bike with the kit, bring it to the street, and 4) start the street “party”. This project showed that bringing life and play to a street does not need too much programming, but simply some tools that can attract children and parents, who can use them directly and spontaneously.

After a delicious lunch prepared by CAID (Cooperation for Support and Integration of people with Disabilities), it was time for the walkshop to key points of interventions in Santo Tirso. We showed the main road of the central axis, where we did our SSA, the views of the old charming park D.Maria II, the recent interventions with a co-existence street and an outer street with continuous sidewalks, speed bumps and a segregated cycle path. We also talked about the programme of Cycling to School, we walked through the most recent urban park next to the municipal library and the recovered banks of the river Sanguinhedo. Most participants used the city’s shared e-bikes (Pedala), to return to the venue, after a detour guided by the city’s Mobility councilor.

The debriefing of the walkshop happened already on the bus on the way to Pontevedra. Listening to how other cities viewed Santo Tirso was eye-opening. They noticed the aspects that for us are commonplace, such as the use of natural stones for paving the streets and sidewalks. They appreciated the green but also noted that there could be more trees and way more benches and shaded places to sit in public space.

Awe-inspiring Pontevedra

The second day was spent in Pontevedra. We were hosted by Jesus Gomez Viñas, Director of Mobility and Daniel Macenlle, Director of Civil Protection. The mayor Miguel Anxo Lores has started the meeting with a short reflection:

“After 23 years we can show that it is possible to change completely. We have more economic activity. The city works better. And I believe we are all happier now.
You need to have a project of what you want to do, and the project must be adapted to your city. And you need to have political will to make this project a reality.
Many times you have political will but not support from the municipal staff. Or you have the other: will from the municipal staff but no political will.
You need to have both. And it's great when that happens.”

In the morning, we had presentations of the transformations achieved in the city in the past 23 years. The change was guided by the three goals of 1.Road safety, 2. Accessibility, 3.Pedestrian priority and 4. Traffic reduction. This has shifted mobility patterns drastically. Now, 70% of trips are made on foot or by bike, and even 70% of children above 7 years old go to school on their own. Pontevedra had no road fatalities in the last 10 years, while before they 9 fatalities per year.

They achieved these with multiple policies. Limiting maximum speed to 30km/h and enforcing it with traffic calming measures (e.g., speed bumps). Prioritizing pedestrians meant also to ensure that in a cross-section of a street at least 50% of space is allocated to pedestrians and other uses. Restricting car-use was possible by removing parking spaces and redesigning street directions to make it harder to ride in a straight line. Before, the center of the Pontevedra was crossed by 200,000 movements of cars per day, and 25% was just through-traffic. Nowadays they consider that the volume of traffic in a street should be maximum 3,000 vehicles per day, to not compromise the quality of the street.

Accessibility is another principle they use. Most streets have been levelled so that there is no height difference between sidewalks and the road, and it is more welcoming for pedestrians and people with reduced mobility, people with baby prams, and bikes. There are still parking places. Some are free, within walking distance of the center. Others, in the center, can be used for 15 minutes, for certain needs: e.g., for pick-up, deliveries, support people with mobility limitations.

Later we went on a guided visit through the city, and awed at junctions that before were crossed daily by more than 60,000 vehicles. Now they look like this:

Finally, there were some quotes from Pontevedra that we will all remember:

“A car is private property, and the question of where to park it is a problem of the owner.”
“When you buy a car, you do not buy 10 square meters of public space to store it.”