The first projects focusing on urban mobility in Warsaw are being launched in Warsaw and 15 communes near Warsaw. Local government bodies of Greater Warsaw will acquire PLN 60 million of EU funds for the extension of the Park & Ride system under the Integrated Territorial Investments instrument included in the Regional Operational Programme for the Mazowieckie Voivodeship for 2014-2020. Soon agreements will be concluded for funding selected projects.
The Warsaw agglomeration is aspiring to become a strong socio-economic centre in Europe while maintaining a local perspective. The strength of our city and its metropolitan area depends primarily on the residents, their aspirations, dedication, creativity and openness. Greater Warsaw aims at becoming a friendly place accessible to its residents. It aspires to be appealing enough for high-class specialists in various sectors of the economy to settle here. Therefore, it is important for local government bodies involved in the development of the metropolis to carry out measures to improve the quality of life of residents through projects aimed at, i.a., limiting the emissions of pollutants and the transport burden in the agglomeration. An important element of implementing these assumptions is the creation of a system of Park & Ride facilities. The car park network will prove particularly useful to the residents of the suburbs in their daily commuting to the city centre and encourage people to use collective transport, as the main argument in favour of choosing specific investments was their coordination with urban transport.
As a result of cooperation between the Local Government of the Mazowieckie Voivodeship, the City of Warsaw, and communes nearby Warsaw, 13 projects were selected for implementation, thanks to which the network of Park & Ride facilities will be expanded. The planned investment will cover building new or redeveloping the existing car parks in Warsaw and the neighbouring communes (Marki, Leszno, Wołomin, Kobyłka, Legionowo, Radzymin, Podkowa Leśna, Ząbki, Żyrardów, Grodzisk Mazowiecki, Wieliszew, Jaktorów, Pruszków, Piastów, and Michałowice). It is worth emphasising that one of the crucial selection criteria was the vicinity of the planned investment to collective transport stops, which should encourage residents to use public transport. Commuters will be able to park free of charge on the basis of a city transport ticket or a ticket issued by a local transport-service provider. It is assumed that P&R facilities located in communes around Warsaw will be marked in a uniform way. All this is to make sure that the residents can easily distinguish between P&R facilities and other illegal or commercial car parks.
This is only the first step towards building a network of “Park & Ride facilities in Greater Warsaw. Further calls for proposals are planned to complete this task. In February 2017 another competition will be launched with an allocation of EUR 6,000,000. The process of concluding co-funding agreements for educational projects and those associated with economic development under the Integrated Territorial Investments instrument is underway.
