Photo: ©Femke van den Heuvel
On Thursday, October 8, 2026, Lucas Harms will deliver his public lecture to mark his appointment as Adjunct Professor of Smart and Sustainable Mobility at Utrecht University of Applied Sciences. The event is also part of the Dutch Cycling Week program and can be attended in person or via livestream.
Utrecht is known worldwide as a cycling city. At the same time, the region is growing faster than ever: in the coming years, thousands of new homes, jobs, and commuters will be added, while the available space isn’t keeping pace. How can our cities remain accessible without compromising quality of life, health, and safety? What role do data and technology play in this? And perhaps even more importantly: who is our mobility system actually designed for?
Lucas Harms will address these questions in his public lecture. Together with colleagues from the Center of Expertise Smart Sustainable Cities and the Process Innovation & Information Systems research group, he will seek answers and explore innovative solutions for the city of tomorrow.
A mobility system for everyone
In his public lecture, Harms takes the audience on a journey through the major mobility challenges of our time. We are in the midst of a transition in which sustainability, digitization, land use, and traffic safety are fundamentally changing the mobility landscape. At the same time, questions about inclusion, accessibility, and social justice are becoming increasingly important. No matter how smart and sustainable a mobility system may be, it is only truly future-proof when everyone can move about freely and safely.
Drawing on current research projects, Harms demonstrates how practice-oriented research can contribute to solutions for societal issues surrounding mobility. Topics covered include shared mobility in new urban neighborhoods, the relationship between cycling and health, social safety on bike routes, virtual reality applications in education, and international collaboration on the mobility of the future.
