Dresden Mobility Plan 2035+
Initial Situation
The state capital Dresden is currently updating its urban strategy for mobility and transport development. With the Dresden Mobility Plan 2035+ (DMP), a new, forward-looking strategic document is to be created, facing the challenge of securing high-quality mobility for the population while simultaneously meeting climate protection requirements. The plan builds on the 2025+ Transport Development Plan, which has already exemplarily adopted and implemented the European Union guidelines for Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans (SUMP).
Despite the significant successes initiated by the 2025+ Transport Development Plan, the results of the first evaluation report indicate that the planned goals for reducing transport-related CO₂ emissions have not yet been achieved. Given the increasing importance of climate protection, growing time pressures, and the emerging energy and financial crisis, a key focus of the mobility plan is to determine how the transport transition required for achieving climate neutrality can be implemented in a binding manner.
As a first step for the Mobility Plan 2035+, a facilitated dialogue process developed 14 guiding mobility objectives for Dresden. These were presented to and adopted by the City Council in 2022. The development of the mobility plan, particularly the design and evaluation of measures and scenarios, builds upon the adoption of these guiding objectives.
In the concept development, the focus must go beyond climate targets to include all other guiding objectives. To this end, a multi-criteria evaluation method is being developed, enabling qualitative and quantitative assessment of goal achievement based on measurable indicators. A key outcome of the scenario process is a preferred scenario, which sets the framework for identifying and justifying the proposed measures.
The final version of the Dresden Mobility Plan is scheduled to be adopted by the Dresden City Council by the end of 2025.
Approach
The following key areas are to be addressed in the development of the Dresden Mobility Plan 2035+:
- Preparation and consolidation of existing plans and resolutions, onboarding of all process participants
- Preparation and adaptation of the guiding objectives process and development of an evaluation system
- Derivation and assessment of measures and scenarios, justification of a preferred scenario
- Design of real-world laboratories (Living Labs)
- Development of an action plan and derivation of complementary sectoral concepts
- Concept for monitoring, evaluation, and implementation management
- Documentation, coordination, and stakeholder participation
Results
The Dresden Mobility Plan 2035+ is intended to serve as a roadmap into the future, enabling residents to travel comfortably, flexibly, and safely amid the upcoming challenges. It is a roadmap designed to preserve and strengthen a livable, urban city while providing an effective response to the climate crisis.
In addition to formulating the action objectives and the associated push and pull measures, a key outcome of the mobility plan is a binding implementation management system. As a foundation for this, the necessary concepts must be developed for continuous monitoring, periodic evaluation, and adaptive management. This includes recommendations on how decisions required for adaptive management can be made and implemented promptly and bindingly. In our view, this is the only way to ensure the necessary goal certainty and resilience of the action plan.