CITYWALK2.0 at New Urban Habits Festival

On June 21, 2026, URBASOFIA represented the CityWalk 2.0 project at the national level during the New Urban Habits Festival, organized by UrbanizeHub in Bucharest. The festival brought together professionals from national and local public administrations, as well as experts in urban planning, architecture, sociology, and other related fields.

As part of the festival, URBASOFIA hosted the "Behaviour-Change Lab", an interactive workshop dedicated to behavioural change and sustainable urban mobility, building on the experience and outcomes of the CityWalk 2.0 project.

The workshop was structured in two parts. The first introduced the CityWalk 2.0 project, its objectives, and its key results. The second consisted of an interactive, game-based exercise inspired by the research and findings developed throughout the project.

Participants were divided into two groups, each assigned a different urban context: Bucharest's city centre or a neighbourhood in Satu Mare. Each group randomly selected two fictional personas, two physical barriers, and two cultural or behavioural barriers, and was asked to imagine how these individuals navigate their daily journeys within the assigned area.

Based on these scenarios, participants worked together to identify six mobility interventions, three "soft" measures and three "hard" measures, selected from the CityWalk 2.0 toolkits, with the aim of addressing the challenges faced by their personas.

The exercise encouraged participants to better understand the diverse mobility needs of different user groups and highlighted the importance of integrating behavioural change into the transition towards sustainable mobility. By combining storytelling with practical problem-solving, the workshop invited participants to develop concrete, people-centred solutions for changing travel behaviour.

We were pleased to be joined by the CityWalk 2.0 project team from Satu Mare, who presented their pilot action, shared their experience as one of the project's pilot cities, and provided participants with valuable insights into the local study area.

The workshop also benefited from the participation of a national representative of the FairMobility project (funded by the Driving Urban Transitions – DUT Partnership), who offered an overview of the national and local policy framework for mobility, while also sharing valuable perspectives on the mobility experiences and challenges faced by minority communities when trying to travel safely through urban environments.