Reasons to come to Stockholm in September 2009
Stockholm, Capital of Scandinavia
Stockholm is uniquely located across fourteen islands between Lake Malaren and the Baltic Sea, on the East coast of Sweden. The capital of Sweden with its 1.2 million inhabitants is a modern city where people and cultures from all over the world meet. Stockholm offers a variety of sights and leisure activities ranging from sightseeing by boat to visiting the royal castle.
The city is the perfect host for the ITS World Congress 2009 with its blend of high-tech transport solutions including metro, bus, commuter trains and even an inner-city boat line. Stockholm was one of the first cities to introduce environmental zoning, along with sophisticated number plate recognition and payment systems.
History
Stockholm has been the political and economic centre of Sweden since the 13th century. The Swedish Regent Birger Jarl is said to have founded Stockholm in 1252. He built the necessary fortifications of the city on the island which is now called the Old Town, Gamla stan. Thanks to its strategic location between Lake Malaren and the Baltic Sea, Stockholm soon became the commercial centre of the region. Stockholm began to take the form of a city during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries when the Old Town took its current shape. Since then the neighbouring islands have been inhabited. Today, Stockholm has become a modern, technologically advanced, and multicultural city.
ITS in Daily Life
The focus of the ITS World Congress 2009 in Stockholm is on the implementation of ITS solutions which improve our everyday lives, as well as on how these can benefit end users and help reduce the negative impact on the environment caused by today’s transport.
A pioneer in the field of ITS, Sweden is uniquely placed to be the host of the ITS Congress & Exhibition in 2009. From an international perspective, Swedes enjoy a very high ICT standard, with more mobile telephones and computers per capita than any other country in the world. Thanks to the country’s low population density combined with long distances, ITS has become an important area of development for private enterprises and the public sector alike. This makes the ITS World Congress 2009 a natural forum for everyone working in the field.
Not only can ITS reduce costs and streamline logistics, it can also contribute to safe and secure transport. ITS involves everything from alcohol interlocks to mobile telephony and sophisticated traffic management systems.
The potential of and the need for ITS in coordinating travel and transport between different transport modes is increasing rapidly. New and sophisticated technology, open platforms and new business models are emerging at an ever faster rate, helping ITS development to pick up speed. Rapid deployment of ITS solutions will help make transport more efficient and environmentally-friendly.
Sweden has a long tradition of collaboration between different stakeholders, both within the public and private sectors. In Sweden, economic growth and care for the environment are two sides of the same coin.
Stockholm and ITS
In Stockholm, city planners were faced with a considerable challenge: to protect one of Europe’s largest medieval city centres from damage by pollution, while ensuring accessibility of the transport system and the city centre’s facilities for all citizens. ITS helped to solve the problem. In order to preserve the unique cultural history of the Old Town, special goods terminals have been constructed and the weight and exhaust emissions of transportation vehicles have been strictly regulated in order to preserve the city’s oldest buildings.
However, this is just the beginning. Strategic priorities for Stockholm include reducing traffic congestion and improving journey time reliability for transport users.
Stockholm introduced a congestion charging system in 2006, which cut traffic in the city centre by 20% initially. The revenue generated by the charging system is now being re-invested in infrastructure improvement, such as travel time information systems, digital travel planning and other ITS equipment and services.ITS systems already introduced include a traffic control centre to manage and control traffic, and to coordinate and disseminate information on the conditions of the road network and events in Stockholm.
International access
Stockholm has three international airports, Arlanda, Bromma and Skavsta. Together they serve more than 100 destinations. Transfer time from Arlanda, which is the busiest airport of the three, to the centre of Stockholm is 20 minutes and from the city centre to the Stockholm International Fair – where the Congress and Exhibition will be held, the transfer takes 9 minutes.
The Stockholm International Fair
The Stockholm International Fair is the leading fair organiser in the Baltic Sea Region, and organises some 60 industry exhibitions as well as around 100 national and international congresses, conferences and events annually. Every year the Stockholm International Fair welcomes 10,000 exhibitors, 1.5 million visitors and more than 8,000 journalists from all over the world.
Stockholm International Fairs & Congress Centre is situated in the southwest area of Stockholm. The centre is easily accessible by public transport or car. A commuter train connects the central station with the exhibition site in 9 minutes. From Arlanda Airport, the fair centre can be reached by car or by bus within one hour.
