Sustainable Urban Mobility & Parking Solutions

The City of Linz (Austria, ca. 215,000 inhabitants) is looking for partners to jointly research and test how street space freed from car parking can be turned into lasting value for the neighbourhood. Linz is currently developing a city-wide Masterplan Parken. Its conception phase runs until 2028, and implementation follows until 2035. One of its eight fields of action defines standards for the use of public space. In particular, it sets guiding principles for what happens to kerbside space once parking is removed or bundled in neighbourhood garages. Draft principles exist, covering mobility, safety, quality of stay and local economy. What is still missing is evidence on several questions: which after-uses actually work, for whom, and at what long-term maintenance cost. We also need to learn how the reallocation can be negotiated fairly between residents, businesses and municipal departments. We want to close this gap in real Linz neighbourhoods and together with peer cities.

Key Objectives:

• Turn general principles for public space into an operational decision framework. It should show which after-use fits which street type and neighbourhood context, and how priorities are set in a transparent, negotiated process. Candidate uses include public transport and active mobility, mobility hubs and sharing, greening and sponge-city elements, play and places to linger, school streets, loading zones, markets and pop-up uses.

• Test temporary and permanent reuse in 2–3 Linz neighbourhoods with high parking pressure. We focus on areas where on-street parking can be concentrated in neighbourhood garages, and start with tactical urbanism before permanent redesign.

• Clarify long-term stewardship: who maintains new green, blue and social spaces over time (municipal operation, sponsorships, partnerships with residents and businesses), and how this can be financed.

• Define impact indicators and a before/after monitoring covering use intensity, perceived safety, microclimate, local economic activity and inclusiveness. These indicators complement today's parking-centred indicators and feed into the Masterplan's monitoring.

Ideal Partner Profile:
We welcome collaboration with:

• Research institutions in urban design, landscape architecture, transport planning or social sciences with proven experience in evaluating street-space reallocation and participatory processes.

• Cities that have already transformed on-street parking, for example through superblocks, school streets, parklets or kerbside programmes, and want to compare governance and maintenance models with us.

• Practitioners in tactical urbanism, co-creation and moderation of local conflicts.

• Experts in the maintenance and stewardship of green-blue infrastructure and nature-based solutions.

• Partners with expertise in local economies, such as footfall and retail analysis, and in business models for mixed-use garages, including PPP.

Collaboration Format:

• Linz participates as a full project partner and living lab with dedicated staff capacity, not only as a pilot site.

• Joint development of the decision framework, based on Linz data and experience from partner cities.

• Co-creation formats in the selected neighbourhoods with residents, businesses, schools and municipal departments, running before, during and after interventions.

• A structured comparison with 1–3 peer cities of similar size, leading to guidelines transferable to other medium-sized European cities.

Why Partner With Us?

• Policy window: the Masterplan is in its conception phase until 2028. Project results will flow directly into municipal standards and into implementation decisions from 2029 onward.

• Data foundation: a city-wide survey of on-street parking supply is under way. Linz also brings residential permit data, public transport quality classes, and an established assessment method for neighbourhood garage sites.

• Established cross-departmental structure: planning, traffic authority, parking management, green space, communications and the municipal utility already work together under the Masterplan.

• Synergies with ongoing research on neighbourhood garages in Linz and with the city's role as an Austrian pioneer city for climate neutrality.

• Alignment with the EU Green Deal, the New European Bauhaus and the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs 11, 13).

Next Steps:
Interested parties are invited to submit a short proposal (max. 2 pages) outlining:

1. Your expertise and references in street-space reallocation, public-space design or stewardship.

2. Your proposed contribution to the objectives above.

3. Your preferred collaboration model and role in a consortium.

Contact:
Naomi Morishita-Steffen, Magistrat der Landeshauptstadt Linz