From March 26 to 28, 2025, the French Living Lab in GRANULAR – Pays Pyrénées Méditerranée – hosted the first GRANULAR cross visit, featuring a three-day programme centred on Rural Mobility. In total, seven cross visits are planned within the project, each organised by a different Living Lab. These events are pivotal in fostering knowledge exchange and collaboration among rural communities across Europe. They build upon the experiences and achievements consolidated by the Multi-Actor Labs over the past two years of the project.
A Diverse and Engaged Group
The cross visit brought together 15 participants from over eight countries, including members from GRANULAR Living Lab, researchers, rural practitioners, and representatives from local administrations. The event provided a valuable opportunity for participants to engage with a diverse range of local stakeholders, promoting meaningful interactions and exchanges.
Understanding Local Mobility Challenges
The event began with an in-depth exploration of local mobility challenges through meetings with key public and private stakeholders in the region. The first day focused on the mobility strategy for rural areas in Occitanie (the NUTS2 region where the French Living Lab is located), highlighting innovative approaches to address these challenges. This was followed by presentations on participatory initiatives involving citizens in mobility planning, culminating in a visit to the municipality of Elne to observe these efforts in action.
Into the Hinterland
The second day immersed participants in the hinterland, with themed stops along the Pirinexus bike path. These stops provided opportunities to engage with local stakeholders and discuss challenges related to accessing everyday services in sparsely populated mountain areas. In the afternoon, GRANULAR partner, Ecorys, led a session that shifted the focus back to policy and rural proofing. This session allowed participants to test a local strategy, evaluate its impact, and collectively reflect on the validation process, based on the project’s report on Guidelines for rural proofing policies in Europe.
Big Data and Tourism Mobility
The third and final day of the Cross Visit culminated in a dialogue between European and local stakeholders in mobility and tourism. The workshop opened a discussion on the potential and limitations of leveraging big data to monitor tourist mobility in rural areas. Presentations highlighted GRANULAR’s work with Facebook data (led by the University of Southampton) and TripAdvisor data (by IIASA) at the EU level. A local stakeholder also presented a case study on using mobile phone geolocation data to characterise tourist flows. The session concluded with participants exchanging best practices and mobility solutions for tourists in rural areas from their respective regions.
Next Stops: Spain and Poland
Looking ahead, the members of the Living Labs are excited to continue the exchange in 2025, with the next cross visits. In May, they will explore rural wellbeing in the Spanish Living Lab in Ourense, Galicia. And in June, the cross visit will focus on food chains at the Living Lab in Western Pomerania, Poland.
