Since March 2025, the project "Change Agents to strengthen sustainability skills in transport planning using the example of the city of Cologne", funded by the German Federal Environmental Foundation (DBU), has been running, in which new educational formats for municipal administrations are being developed that specifically impart skills for sustainable mobility and urban development. It is being carried out by the two chairs of Geography and its Didactics/Social Geography and General Geography/Human-Environment Research at the University of Wuppertal in cooperation with the Study Association for Tunnels and Transport Facilities (STUVA) and Schüßler-Plan Ingenieurgesellschaft.

The city of Cologne is also a partner in the project. It is serving as a model municipality. Around 20 of its employees are being trained as change agents as part of the project. Their thoughts and actions are intended to contribute to the planning and realisation of tomorrow's mobility.

The training format to be trialled is methodically based on service learning, a form of teaching and learning that combines teaching with social engagement, as well as on a real-life experiment. In the course of the experiment, actors from various offices will work together with experts from the project's cooperation partners to develop socially relevant solutions for the sustainability challenge of "transport and mobility of tomorrow". In addition to the 20 change agents, who will later act as multipliers, the experts involved will also receive additional training.

"The aim of the project is to enable transferability to other municipalities. The knowledge gained on new sustainable planning practices is to be presented at specialist conferences and in a practical guide and thus also made available to other municipalities and planning offices," explains project manager Prof Dr Andreas Keil.

Further information on the project can be found on the DBU website.