Europe’s largest event in intelligent transport systems and services, the 11th ITS European Congress, has come to an end, after a week where the continent’s transportation community were able to share knowledge, experiences and conduct business.
Running from June 6-9, the event in Glasgow, Scotland, was organized by ERTICO – ITS Europe in partnership with the European Commission (EC), and hosted by Glasgow City Council, Visit Scotland, the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre (SECC), ITS United Kingdom, Transport Scotland, and the Glasgow City Marketing Bureau. Overall, 2,000 participants attended the Congress, with 958 delegates representing 44 countries from all over the globe. The busy week gathered 90 exhibitors demonstrating the latest in ITS technologies and services, with 500 speakers taking part in over 100 sessions.
The three Plenary and nine Executive Sessions focused on high priority topics in Europe. The Congress started with the connected and automated vehicles debate in the first Plenary, passing through ‘smart cities’ and sustainable transport on Tuesday. On Wednesday, top industry and government speakers presented space technologies, maps and ITS for freight and logistics, while Mobility as a Service (MaaS) was debated in the last Plenary on Thursday.
“With these numbers, and the experiences this week, we are very satisfied,” said Didier Gorteman, director of Congresses at ERTICO – ITS Europe. “We received a lot of positive feedback from exhibitors, sponsors, and visitors, and the success of this event is the result of a great cooperation between ERTICO, the European Commission and our fantastic hosts, Glasgow City Council and Transport Scotland.”
With the end of the Glasgow Congress, work has already started on the the preparations for the 12th ITS European Congress, which will take place in France in June 2017. Representatives from the next host city, Strasbourg, were in Glasgow, together with ITS France, and a delegation of start-ups and major players from the ITS field based in the Upper Rhine region. The vice-president for Strasbourg Eurometropolis, Catherine Trautmann, who is also the current European coordinator for the TEN-T North Sea-Baltic Corridor with the European Commission, participated enthusiastically in this week’s sessions, as well as in the first ever Mayor’s Summit, which was held on Wednesday morning at the Glasgow City Chamber.
Hamilton Purdie, host project manager for the 11th ITS European Congress, commented, “I feel proud to have been part of this team. After over a year of work, I think we have pulled together a comprehensive program, which included not only sessions, but also demonstrations and technical visits, that appealed to all sectors of the ITS industry.”
