Region Blekinge (lead partner) received funding for 7 months project starting September 2021. The partners include Blekinge Institute of Technology, Sweden, InnoBaltica, Poland, The Association of Sea Cities and Municipalities, Poland, Association of Klaipėda region municipalities, Lithuania and the State Enterprise of the Kaliningrad region “Avtovokzal”, Russia.

The project idea springs from the recently finalized Interreg South Baltic project Interconnect. The project resulted in an established network for cross-border public transport (PT) planning as well as developed user-friendly tools for cross-border travel by PT. The network identified the potential to apply PT project result on the sustainable tourism business, with focus on rural areas since the lack of a holistic view on sustainable public transport planning applied on the tourism sector was identified as a problem hampering development. The aim of this project proposal is to prepare for an Action Plan for a cross-sectoral committed partnership with a transdisciplinary approach, focusing on seamless cross-border public transport applied to the tourism sector. The partnership has been integrated in the political platform Euroregion Baltic, with Region Blekinge assigned to lead mobility core issues and will prepare an extended project application for final implementation.

Text by, and contact person at BTH is Varvara Nikulina.