NEXT MOBILITY EXHIBITION TO BE LAUNCHED IN MILAN (12-14 OCTOBER 2022). A NEW EUROPEAN FAIR FOCUSED ON PUBLIC AND COLLECTIVE MOBILITY

Milan, 22 december 2021. Next Mobility Exhibition (NME) will be launched in Milan next year, from 12 to 14 October 2022. It’ll be the kickoff of a brand new format, with biennial appointment, dedicated to the mobility of the future to be held at Fiera Milano. The exhibition, organized by Fiera Milano, will have as partners the three Italian trade organization involved in bus-based mobility and public transport: AGENS (Agenzie Confederale dei Trasporti e dei Servizi), ANAV (Associazione Nazionale Autotrasporto Viaggiatori) and ASSTRA (Associazione Trasporti).

The European Commission’s goal, as set out in the Green Deal, of achieving climate neutrality by 2050 (and a 55% reduction in carbon footprint by 2030), inevitably involves reducing emissions from transport. This will be possible thanks, first and foremost, to the strengthening of public transport and collective transport in general, since the real challenge of sustainability and ecological transition is the transfer of significant modal shares from private to collective and intermodal mobility.

In this sense, it is essential to achieve the Next Generation EU target, in Italy, of transferring 10% of private motorized mobility to local public transport, which in itself can significantly reduce the environmental footprint of transport. A further contribution, also in terms of service quality and efficiency, would come from the renewal of the pre-Euro 5 bus fleet with low environmental impact technological solutions (electric, hybrid, CNG, latest generation engines or hydrogen).

In this framework, innovation, digitalization and technology appear to be the key enabling factors for developing and promoting a new model of smart, integrated and sustainable mobility that fits in well with the ecological and energy transition process launched by the PNRR (the Italian project within Next Generation EU), where 2.42 billion euros are invested in the renewal of Local Public Transport vehicles, in addition to a further 600 million until 2026.

“We want to give life in Italy to an international appointment that tackles the theme of mobility in an enlarged, organic and sustainable development key,” says Luca Palermo, CEO and General Manager of Fiera Milano. “Public and collective bus transport represents, in Italy alone, a market worth a total of €12.4 billion a year. The goal will be to create new opportunities in order to contribute to the relaunch of the Italian mobility supply chain at national and international level, encouraging the development of industrial leadership in the sustainable mobility sector by targeting the important ecological transition process underway. NME will become the leading event in Europe on People’s Mobility at 360° thanks also to its geographical location. The city of Milan, in fact, is the perfect place to organize and host an event of this magnitude as well as having all the credentials to be at the centre of a wide-ranging international debate on mobility”.

“Integration between companies and between different transport systems will be the driving force behind a new development of the sector,” says Arrigo Giana, President of Agens (as well as General Manager of ATM Milano). “And this change of model, this different approach, will be a stimulus in order to try giving the country a new ‘fabric’ of companies able to focus on innovation, sustainability and to compete with major European and global competitors”. “The challenges we face are global and multifaceted: environmental, digital and qualitative. Our sector needs a change of pace, a new industrial structure at the service of the country. In this sense, the setting and resonance of Fiera Milano are the best place to start this process”.

“The bus is an all-round sustainable mode of passenger transport,” says Giuseppe Francesco Vinella, President of ANAV. “Given its capacity and average occupancy rates, the bus is a means of transport with low harmful emissions per passenger, it can replace up to 30 cars, with consequent benefits in terms of environment and space occupation, it is extremely safe, with accident rates similar to those of trains, and it is socially inclusive, given its intrinsic cost-effectiveness. It is now a matter of taking up all the new challenges that await the sector as a whole and Next Mobility Exhibition is certainly a fundamental opportunity for the growth of the entire collective mobility system”.

“We welcomed the proposal to set up in Milan an Exhibition dedicated to the Collective Mobility of the Future because this is a unique moment to enrich the panorama of a new platform for meeting, comparison and exchange, capable of strengthening the national mobility market” says Andrea Gibelli, President of ASSTRA. “The country, with the PNRR, has just begun a profound transformation process that requires enormous collective efforts to lay the foundations for the near future. ASSTRA is therefore taking part in the initiative in continuity with its own conference offer, reinforcing its role as an interpreter of new trends, in a rapidly accelerating world. The range of opportunities for participation in international and national trade fairs is thus extended, with the aim of promoting the mobility industry in all its forms and supporting its growth in Italy and abroad”.