SUMP: Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan

Solution

As of 2026, having a 'Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan', or a SUMP for short, is expected to be a requirement for European muncipalities. Creating a SUMP leads to sustainable mobility policy. Given the climate challenge, muncipalities should actually be already working on a SUMP. Additional advantage: municipalities with a SUMP are eligible for EU subsidies. What exactly does a SUMP entail and how do you create one? We are happy to provide you with answers.

What is a SUMP?

A SUMP is a mobility plan that complies with European guidelines. It is an integrated plan for sustainably improving mobility in a city or region, in order for mobility to contribute to the liveability of the area. When creating a SUMP, special attention is given to participation of all stakeholders and to the monitoring and evaluation part. (Emission-free) logistics and mobility hubs also play a prominent role in SUMPs. The area for which a SUMP is drawn up does not necessarily correspond to municipal boundaries (as is often the case with mobility plans). A SUMP is set up for a functional urban area (FUA). Its boundaries are determined by the daily flow of goods and people.

We are happy to help you create a SUMP. Given the climate and housing challenge we are facing and the increased inequality within our society, it is good to start now. A SUMP makes mobility play an appropriate and positive role within and beyond the borders of your municipality. To create a SUMP together, we go through four steps.

Setting up a SUMP in 4 steps

Getting started: assessing current situation using data
We determine the boundaries of the functional urban area (FUA) for which the SUMP should be drawn up. We do this based on data that gives us insight into the daily flows of people and goods, e.g. data on origins and destinations for different modes such as car, public transport and bicycle, or data from traffic models.

Next, we analyse the challenges and opportunities within this functional urban area:
- We identify the main topics of current national, provincial and municipal policies, such as mobility, safety, housing and sustainability.
- We collect input from residents and other interested parties, for example through online surveys or focus groups
- We collect and analyse quantitative (mobility) data; traffic accidents, modal split, car ownership, demographics, jobs, etc.
- We identify trends and developments, such as population aging, electrification, working from home and shared mobility.
Based on the gained insights, we draw conclusions about the challenges and opportunities within a functional urban area and test them with stakeholders, such as interest representatives, residents, neighbouring municipalities and entrepreneurs.
Developing a strategy: creating a vision 
We set ambitions, targets and indicators:
- We define the ambition, in other words the higher goal of the SUMP, together with you. It originates from, for example, the environment vision or from a coalition agreement.
- Based on the ambition, together with all stakeholders, we formulate which goals we want to achieve, such as 'encouraging cycling' or 'a decreasing trend in the number of traffic accidents'. We define indicators to make these goals measurable. These are also called 'Sustainable Urban Mobility Indicators' (SUMIs).
- With the help of, for instance, a system dynamics model, we can test which scenarios exist to reach a certain goal.
- We examine whether and how the current traffic system should be adapted. In doing so, we also take future spatial developments into account.
- We provide a thematic definition of the goals, for instance by identifying how partial mobility affects the sustainability goal.
Putting together implementation programme

We collect a 'longlist' of measures that potentially contribute to achieving the previously defined goals. Then, out of this, we select the most promising measures together with stakeholders, taking into account funding, required partners and planning.
Implementation and monitoring
As a municipality, you will start implementing the selected measures. We can support you in this. We then help you monitor the measures: 
- In the monitoring and evaluation plan, we describe which indicators we use and what data should be collected for this. To do so, we use the aforementioned Sustainable Urban Mobility Indicators (SUMIs). 
- We structurally keep track of the resources deployed, the activities carried out and the performance achieved, in order to draw lessons for the future.

Financial support 

If you have a SUMP, you may be eligible for European funding to implement parts of your plan. It is therefore always advisable to get in touch about this with people in your organisation who deal with those funding opportunities.

Why Goudappel is an excellent partner to help you draft your SUMP

SUMP expert: We are fully conversant with the SUMP guidelines and understand better than anyone else what a SUMP must meet. We also work on several SUMP projects internationally.
High-quality data: We have access to high-quality data from both public sources such as GIS, and our own data sources such as our traffic models. We convert this data into clear decision information.
Participation and process guidance: we understand the interests of different groups and, as an independent party, can ensure the right discussions with the right players. Goudappel has extensive experience in organising surveys, focus groups, council meetings and walk-in evenings.
Monitoring & evaluation: We have excellent tools to monitor, evaluate and adjust the outcomes of a SUMP where necessary.
Efficient and effective: We have all the expertise related to mobility in-house. This allows us to ensure the integrality of the plan. We can quickly switch between different sub-expertises, such as public transport, parking, logistics, mobility hubs, pedestrians, cycling and climate & energy.
Extensive experience: In Goudappel's 60-year history, we have witnessed and helped shape all developments in mobility. We have also drafted some 40 mobility plans and visions over the past five years