Kaunas, Lithuania: working towards green and healthy sustainable mobility

Like many urban developments, Kaunas, the second-largest city in Lithuania, must manage the demands of economic growth, an increasing population, and environmental and green transport needs.

To address some of these challenges, the Kaunas City Municipality and the Ministries of Health, Environment and Transport of the Republic of Lithuania hosted a Transport, Health and Environment Pan-European Programme (THE PEP) workshop, Improvement of Sustainable Urban Mobility for Better Health and Environment: Move to improve, on 24-25 September 2014. The workshop called on more than 150 participants from the environmental, health, and transport sectors at national and local level to renew efforts to prevent pollution and create favourable health-friendly conditions for citizens.

During the workshop, a new 5.5 km-long cycle path along the Neris riverbank and Jotvingių Street was launched. At the opening ceremony, Andrius Kupčinskas, Mayor of Kaunas, said “We have a vision of becoming a green city through sustainable mobility, which is everyone’s responsibility. The city of Kaunas is already the proud owner of the longest (2 km) pedestrian street in Europe. The city will further promote cycling as part of its sustainable mobility policy by extending the cycling path to 130 km”.

The United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) introduced its transport initiatives on Sustainable Public Transport and Mobility and For Future Inland Transport Systems (ForFITS), as well as the results of analyses carried out for Kaunas. WHO/Europe presented THE PEP tool entitled Health Economic Assessment Tool (HEAT), including a cost-benefit analysis of increased active mobility in Kaunas.

The workshop was held in the framework of THE PEP Relay Race, a series of capacity-building events to share best practices across different regions.

At the end of the two day workshop, the Mayor and other representatives from the Municipality of Kaunas adopted a number of commitments, with specific measures to help achieve sustainable and healthy mobility and transport by 2023. They will contribute to the implementation of the commitments taken by the Lithuanian Government in the Declaration of the Fourth High-level Meeting on Transport, Health and Environment in Paris on 15 April 2014.