The Portuguese city of Almada was judged by an independent panel of mobility experts to have done the most to promote alternatives to the car, and to highlight the positive impact of other means of transport on public health and the environment during European Mobility Week 2010. With Almada, Murcia in Spain and the Latvian capital Riga were runners-up in this year's contest.

The European Mobility Week Award was designed to reward activities carried out by local authorities in the framework of the European Mobility Week, in order to promote experiences and successes in organising the Week and to raise awareness for the need of local and individual action in the field of sustainable urban mobility. It is awarded to cities that proved to be fruntrunners in terms of sustainable transport and managed to communicate the campaign’s message to citizens.

With this objective, up to 2.221 European towns and cities officially participated between 16 and 22 September in the ninth annual edition of European Mobility Week. In this edition, the portuguese city of Almada has been selected as the the local authority deemed to have done most in raising public awareness of sustainable travel as a means of promoting physical activity and to contribute to reducing noise, air pollution and congestion that are known to have detrimental effects on health and well-being.

The finalists of the Award given for the 2010 campaign were celebrated at an official ceremony in the Brussels on 14 March 2011. The list of top 10 cities in the European Mobility Week Award 2010 was completed with Murcia (Spain) and Riga (Latvia) which had the highest scores with Almada, followed by Budapest (Hungary), Eindhoven (The Netherlands), Gävle (Sweden), León (Spain), Östersund (Sweden), Reutte (Austria) and Zagreb (Croatia).

European Mobility Week Award 2010 winning city, Almada

The Portuguese coastal city of Almada promoted sustainable mobility through dozens of permanent measures. To commemorate the 10th anniversary of EMW in Almada, the municipality – together with the local Energy Agency – organised an impressive week of activities dedicated to sustainable transport and health. This culminated in a major event on 18 September – Mobility Festival Day – offering street markets, demonstrations of electrical vehicles, bicycle fairs, concerts, sport activities, dance and street performances, bike sprints, workshops, films, exhibitions and street art demonstrations. Almada also improved the road infrastructure for pedestrians and cyclists and created several bicycle parking places and charging stations for bikes and electric vehicles. For Car Free Day, Almada converted the historic and commercial centre of Cacilhas into a pedestrian zone.

Finalist cities Murcia and Riga

Further to the activities for the EMW, Murcia launched a range of permanent measures to encourage cycling, including a bicycle strategy, an office with a dedicated website, a public bicycle system and free bikes for city staff. The city also extended bus lines, introduced integrated fares with cheaper rates for specific categories of users and upgraded its electronic traffic management services.

The Latvian capital city Riga encouraged active travel by offering an ambitious programme of activities around cycling. This included competitions, exhibitions, information programmes, retro cycling tours, promotion of electric vehicles, demonstrations on air quality measurement and traffic safety, art performances, concerts and street games on the theme of transport and health.