European community for mobility management

Christophet, 

Although I agree with most you're saying (although I do think this conference was better than the one in graz, the pecha kucha making some presentations bearable and interesting.. missed the party though), i think the problem might be even laying a layer below.

Marjan Frederix (Mobiel 21) asked mewhat I heard for new stuff, and I had to remain silent for at least 30 seconds. For me that means that either the frontrunners and the backlogs of mobility management are too much apart for being on one conference or that we fail to make enough connections to other fields.

When It's used mainly as a network event, we should use the strength of network events to help the field further, a radical new way of the structure of the conference is needed, not just longer selecting papers, but far more active trying to use the good point in related papers to make common story, and an active follow up

Epomm should dare to use concepts like Open Space, where you you the power of the coffee break to develop new answers (http://www.openspaceworld.org/) , and not be afraid some delegate might not be able to understand it, one can stull provide for themtoo..

Rick Lindeman 361 days ago

Rick!

Open space will be great for the networking part. But I also think that there should be much more of high profile speakers, who really can explain and inspire about the benefits of MM.

Christer Ljungberg 361 days ago

@chris, don't think speakers are the solution, when they aren't use to create more discussion and development , but as just akeynote speaker..

Rick Lindeman 361 days ago

In my opinion the new elements in ECOMM like the Rendez vous, the Pecha Kucha and the Social Networking with Twitter and.... have broad a new dimenssion.  I agree with Christer and Rick the feelings about the outcome. What shall we do.  At the firtst ECOMM in Amsterdam (1997) we have had a strong focuss on the outcome of the conference. The question was "What are the conclusions of the conference?" What are the actions to be taken? In this first conference the 200 participants have to vote about these draft conclusions and we (the organisation) have delivered them to the European Transport Council. Doing so you will set a statement and brings it to a higher level. You will be able to use this statement later on in your policy process!  For me the contribution of David Robles Fosg from Google was an success, an eyeopener. Also the nummber of 24 involved countries was very good

Marien G. Bakker 361 days ago

In my opinion it would be good to reinvent ECOMM. To for fill the need of a more experienced audience there must be a place were experience can be exchanged on the right level. The question is if ECOMM /EPOMM as it is organized at this moment is the right platform to organize the ‘quality boost’ that is necessary. It seems that Mobility Managers are not capable to organize the sector.

In my opinion a bigger contribution in money and time is needed to professionalize the sector of mobility management. Otherwise it will be a part of other sectors like parking, -e-driving, public transport and spatial planning. These other sectors realize that Mobility Management is also part of their business and are more and more looking for experience in the field of Mobility Management. Because they are professionally organized they are better capable in giving the quality boost that is needed.

 In my opinion the question should be asked if we are capable of organizing our own sector and give the Quality boost ourselves or if we wait on other sectors to take over of wait for EPOMM en the next organizing Cities?

Minze Walvius 361 days ago

Yes...many of the points raised are indeed valuable and totally relevant - especially Christer's opening piece and the issue Marien raised about an outcome from the ECOMM and about taking this to a higher level.

To concentrate a little on this latter point...as ECOMM is a major event organised, supported and funded (in part) by the EPOMM members, and bearing in mind the national level of involvement EPOMM aims to operate at, to have somebody from the EC should be a pre-requisite for any ECOMM.

EPOMM aims to engage with national bodies/boards/ministries on a collective platform in order to raise the profile of  mobility management. It would therefore make sense therefore for ECOMM to provide an opportunity for a broader involvement of such high level representatives so that it proves easier to interest and invite them.

Coming away from ECOMM with a clear statement of intent prepared and signed by the participants would be a good step in the right direction and provide the organisers with the basis for a press release after the event, a plan of action for the EPOMM board as well as a starting point for the following year's ECOMM.

To continue to attract over 300 fee paying participants to ECOMM, the organisers will need to seriously consider ways of making the ECOMM a unique event; a policy and political pacesetter; and a leader rather than a follower in an increasingly congested  calendar of sustainable transport and mobility events, conferences, seminars and workshops.

Jim Mc Geever 360 days ago

Some dissatisfaction with the content of the conference is perhaps not surprising. As the profession grows older those who have worked in the industry for the best part of the last 2 decades expect the event to continue its role it had in the past, setting the direction for future work, challenging and guiding the industry. The current focus appears to be on translating the concept of Mobility Management to facilitate and nurture practical application across Europe, particularly those countries where there has been little or less action to date.

The question is whether ECOMM is following trends or suffering from its organisational structure. The changing focus of industry conferences is a process observed and personally experienced as past Chairman of ACT TravelWise in the UK, and from working with ACT in the USA. As the organisations entered their second decade seasoned professionals started to find events repetitive. The organisations were aware of the lack of appeal to experienced professionals, but prioritised new entrants. They feared that they would struggle to engage new professionals if the focus was too cutting edge, after all they really need help just getting started not adopting the latest innovative approaches. This was not necessarily a bad thing. The more experienced professionals can provide an important service to help inspire, mentor and assist the next generation, but they needed to adjust expectations and seek ‘inspiration’ elsewhere.

Likewise many seasoned professionals still expect to attend ECOMM to find out about the latest thinking, to agree new directions, generate consensus on approaches, etc. Instead they find it more often simply provides a helpful overview of who is doing what across Europe, and an opportunity to catch up with like-minded thinkers. Perhaps it needs to be clearer about its focus?

Evidently there are models where a much better balance can be struck. Take ACT Canada for example. Mobility Management is a relatively new concept (circa 5 years), but already the annual conference there is highly stimulating in terms of innovative new ideas and approaches to Mobility Management. ECOMM take note! Some cities may be more proactive, but too often this is down to the local organisation, not the controlling influence of the EPOMM/ECOMM organisation. The question is does the industry have the strength to make the necessary changes to the way ECOMM is organised?

International leaders in the field Mobility Management, TDM and Sustainable Transport are continuing to work together to pool efforts to organise a regular World Symposium where cutting-edge innovative concepts and latest ideas can be shared. There is a market for this type of event so it is perhaps inevitable that sooner or later an organisation (perhaps from a parallel sector) will move in to fill the vacuum...

Colin Black 360 days ago

Colin!

With such a large number of sessions, workshops etc I think there could be room for ideas directed both to experinced people and newbies. And for all paticipants it mus be interesting to get a feeling that the industry is developing, not only attracting new citeios who come to talk about the same thing as we did ten years ago.

The whole traffic planning branch is not very good at knowledge management (I can say that as chairman of the board at the Swedish Assosiation of Transport Planners). And now it seems like the MM industry is going the same way.

Christer Ljungberg 360 days ago

Thank you for all your interesting contributions.

I've been on very many ECOMMs and I think this was one of the best ones.  I heard a lot of new things, most of them at the speed networking event and in the pecha kucha session. These were the two prime innovations of this ECOMM and I think it is no small fact that we managed this so well.

Keep in mind: ECOMM is organised and financed by the host city, NOT by EPOMM. EPOMM "just" contributes knowhow, logistics, contacts, network and time. For every city, the ECOMM is something very new, complex, and demanding - often also rewarding. Because the city is host, it is also entitled to nominate some (opening) speakers and the moderator.  Often you have to consent into this as it is a co-financing entity (e.g. Ministry). If the minister is boring, how can you prevent him/her from speaking? Very difficult.

Every ECOMM has about half the attendants who are there for the first time! And most of these are from the host country. ECOMM is still and foremost a networking event. Listen to people who come there for the first or second time - they think it is great.

Still, I agree there is need for innovation - and better marketing. But we have to be realistic what can be achieved - given the structure of the ECOMM - it being an event hosted by a different city every year. My suggestions:

• The first innovation is already being realised: the time scheme has been moved, the call for papers will open 1 August. Registration will start end January.  We have much more time to prepare
• Keep and improve pecha kucha and "meet the hosts" speed networking
• Do an individual ECOMM marketing effort (and preparation effort) in each country
• Make room for longer workshops: 2.5 hours
• Make sure to have an EXCELLENT moderator
• No more bilingual panels
• Nominate good experts for presentations and panels. 

Especially this last point is very important. We need more persons like the guy from Google transit or the one from STIB (Brussels). And more confrontation - have someone from the car industry - Daimler or so. But here I count on you - please make suggestions! The earlier the better.

Karl-Heinz Posch 360 days ago

Karl-Heinz points out one of the problems with the ECOMM conferences: The host way to much influence on the programme than is healthy.

EPOMM must take back the power to plan the programme. This will make not every city must start from the beginning. And the city must also be cities that really have been working a lot with MM.

It must be possible to make a conference that fits both experts and newcomers. A few years ago we test introductionary short courses on MM for example. It woreked out fine.

Christer Ljungberg 360 days ago

Many people share the view that EPOMM needs to establish its influence over future ECOMM events. ECOMM is a recognised brand owned by EPOMM – it needs to ensure that the brand is protected. There should be an ECOMM contract signed by the host city that clearly provides power of veto to EPOMM and its organising committee the IPC. This would help to ensure a minimum level of quality is delivered and that local political interference is minimised.

There is an important opportunity to better engage with the Mobility Management profession prior to ECOMM by asking them to explain their priorities, what is of interest and importance to them. This market research could then be used to target the themes of the conference to ensure that they resonate with the target audience. Could Allinx assist with this process?

Further procrastination will mean more established professionals will become disillusioned with ECOMM. Let’s be bolder, and more innovative about how to deliver an exciting conference. The host city will be accommodating – they just need to understand the parameters. Taking some independent soundings of views from across Europe may well be enlightening and help this process.  

With regards to the details of the conference - longer workshops would work better the day before the conference starts. At many conferences delegates have the option to pay extra for these workshops and this tends to ensure that the delivery is more professional.

I too was really hoping to find out more about city planning, how the philosophy had changed and influenced the urban realm and transport system over the years. The city tourist tour was interesting but more the sort of thing I expect on holiday. This is a real opportunity for the host city to share experiences and ideas with industry experts from around the world that was completely missed – Frankfurt take note.

The representative from Google was one of the more interesting, but let’s face it the competition was hardly challenging. Many of us had heard similar things from them, Microsoft, etc over the last 5 years – but unfortunately the critical practical ITS issue of consensus on ‘open source data’ was only briefly touched on. ECOMM needs to take a lead challenging innovation and helping to understand and address the practical realities of delivery. Why not engage with the delegates and ask them to submit questions for plenary speakers in advance?

The Twitter trial was interesting and a success. Undoubtedly more could be done next year to integrate its role in the conference, perhaps encouraging delegates to sign up when they register, using it to submit questions to the panel (as we can do at live political debates on British TV), or displaying commentary more prominently in the conference. Other tools, such as TripIt, could be used as part of the signup process so that delegates can chose to tell others where they are staying, when they are getting into to town, etc – could even help facilitate journey buddies (showing how MM is done!)

Also, why not publish in real-time the details of those who have registered for the event (they could always opt not to through a privacy option) so that it is obvious who might need a prod in each country... These types of features are no longer ‘cutting edge’ they are fast becoming the norm that the industry expects.

At the end of the day EPOMM are responsible for the delivery of a top class event. Do correct me if wrong (it is difficult to find out specific details) but doesn’t EPOMM pay consultants under contract to supervise and ensure the efficient delivery of ECOMM? The profession has every right to hold it accountable and to require the management board and its contractors to show significant future improvement. Other IPC members are volunteers who cover their own (not insignificant) costs to attend meetings and assist ECOMM. With good management, the IPC resource could also be used much more efficiently to help influence and coordinate the organisation of ECOMM.  

Colin Black 359 days ago

I belief that ECOMM has already re-invented itself from this year on. Compared with the quite boring Graz-ECOMM the one from Toulouse was a highlight. I don't speak from the dinner or the formerly famous ECOMM parties which I missed this year but from all the efforts that have been taken from the committee to de-conference. I was so happy that - for the first time - these boring workshops with 3 presentations and a couple of alibi-questions have been replaced by more pecha kucha sessions or by the rendezvous session (which was more a kind of speed dating :).

Of course it isn't so easy to serve all demands of the audience - to provide news for people that already work since ages in this topic and at the same time to invite newcomers to take up the topic of MM. But with this ECOMM I felt that this endeavour was quite successful.

I fully agree that the IPC should have more influence to design the programme and to select speakers / presenters or animateurs to avoid showboater who don't give a damn about what the audience is interested in or if they spend the time of others in the same workshop. But since the IPC and EPOMM is dependend on their national financiers  this influence will certainly be limited.

Robert Pressl 353 days ago

I am very happy with all the comments and suggestions for the best possible ECOMM in the next years. As a member of the EPOMM-board I experienced some frustration with our relation to the host-cities. I fully agree that ECOMM should be a real quality event in good cooperation between the host-city and EPOMM. EPOMM, and especially the board, must take their responsibility for the quality of the conference. For me it's one of the major points on the agenda of the general assembly. But because that will be end November it's to late for Frankfurt. Next week I will speak with some boardmembers and Karl-Heinz about it during our EUROCITIES meeting in Oslo.

Once again thanks for all contributions. We'll be in touch

Wim van Tilburg   

Wim van Tilburg 353 days ago

I'm quite satisfied of having invested my time and money in ECOMM this year.

I absolutely liked the new formats (pecha kucha (?) and the rendez-vous toulousian). In other words I these are very good formats to mix knowlegde exchange and networking (brief presentation, possibility to discuss). Dinners and social moments were also very well organized as far as networking is concerned.

But in my opinion a good conference should be a mix of:

• Networking
• Learning
• Advocacy
• Visiting / Seeing the place / Real examples

As I already said: Networking was 100% ok

Learning: 50% for me. I haven't learned anything really new. Some sessions were really inspiring. The plenary totally useless.

I understand what @Karl-Heinz says regarding the hosting city. One idea to "make a boring minister interesting" is to use a good format (as in "tv format"), where you have a spontaneous discussion (not prepared Q&A), some "conflicts" between different points of view. If everybody agrees, or it's a long monologue: it gets really boring.
Also having someone with a strong message could help.

Advocacy: 0% - I think a conference like this should also be intended to decision makers (relevant policy makers, EU, etc.). I think this is crucial in particular for the Italian case, where mobility managers are "aliens" and there is no culture on this subject. Workers unions, big companies,  politicians should be guests of ECOMM to start to understand what are we talking about, and create a demand of MM solutions.

Visiting: 80%. This is not the focus of the conference, but its one of the reasons to attend (otherwise we could have done a tele-conference). There was enough free time to get a feeling of the city, of its mobility solutions. The guided tours where very good, but not really focussed on MM or Urban Development.

Ciao,
Massimo

Massimo Infunti 351 days ago

Right, let's try again taking the care to save my text as I type...

I agree with Christof's opening post and the Rick Lindeman's subsequent comments, especially with regard to interactivity and the use of open space. More positively, the use of Pecha Kucha to encourage speakers to be concise is to be welcomed. This was my first ECOMM, but a colleague gives me the impression that last year's was more inspiring than Toulouse, which I'm sure is at least partially down to the surroundings and more relevant tours/site visits.

Wearing my carfree hat, I'd like to point out that last year's Towards Carfree Cities Conference in York, which opened a year ago today and was organised largely by volunteers, was designed to be inclusive and attract different markets by having a 'public open day' and a 'professionals day'. We hoped to offer something new and inspiring for all delegates. Our open space session went very well, so I agree with Rick that there is scope for innovative formats like this at ECOMM.

You can judge for yourself whether we achieved our objectives of informing, motivating and assisting participants with their practical work by taking a look at the conference website via the link below. A personal highlight was the street closure (or should that be 'street opening'?) we organised on Bishopthorpe Road, which demonstrated to participants exactly what can be achieved as well as the potential of such events to increase footfall and takings for traders. See it, touch it, taste it...

Programme and presentations for download:http://www.worldcarfree.net/conference/2010/

Photos here: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=160590924912&v=photos&ref=ts#!/photo.php?fbid=177252825650064&set=o.160590924912&type=1&theater

Apologies for the blatant plugging, but I feel benchmarking against other events with similar subject matter and objectives would be a useful for EPOMM and its conference committee.

A common criticism of ECOMM and TCC, and a personal disappointment for me, was the notable lack of attendance by local planning officers and national / EC civil servants and politicians from the very countries and institutions most in need of taking on board the MM and car reduction message. Yes, there is value in meeting friends and doing a little networking, but one must question the effectiveness of approaches that largely preach to the converted. It is of course a bit chicken and egg: representatives of cities and countries have to recognise the problem and want to change their behaviour, but it's up to all of us in the 'new mobility' movement to make a compelling case for participation in our conferences, workshops and projects.

Simon.

Simon Field 325 days ago