09:00-10:00 Plenary session 4
Digitalisation of the transport sector is key to improve the efficiency, safety and sustainability of our transport systems. This involves automating processes in transport and production, enhancing connectivity and leveraging data analytics for better decision-making. Digitalisation impacts various aspects of our transport systems, including transportation infrastructure, logistics, mobility and the role of people. It has the potential to lead to new business models, improved traffic management, increased efficiency in operations and reduced environmental impact. This session will focus on the use of AI in the broader system, automation, cybersecurity and data spaces. The session will also explore the disruptive potential of digital technologies such as quantum computing.
The session aims to find answer to the following questions: what are the next big advancements in transport digitalisation? How to address the fast-paced changes brought by digitalisation and make sure they best serve the EU’s transportation system? How to certify AI for mission-critical applications? How can digitalisation support mobility management and law enforcement and what are the barriers of cybersecurity? Which fundamentals will be transformed in the system in terms of use of infrastructure, resilience and competitiveness?
Panelist:
Paola Cossu, CEO at Fit Consulting & Member of the Board of Directors at ALICE, TRA Vision 2024 winner
Stephane Petti, PhD, Principal Advisor, European Innovation Council Fund
Rugilė Andziukevičiūtė-Buzė, Managing Director, Transport Innovation Association Lithuania
Andreas Boschen, Executive Director, SESAR Joint Undertaking
10:30-12:00 Strategic sessions
Automation and connectivity have the potential to transform and bring major benefits to the transport of people and goods in Europe, improving safety, sustainability, capacity and inclusiveness. The session will discuss the challenges and opportunities of integrating efficiently automated vehicles into the transport system from both the technical and the socio-economic perspective, including the offer of new mobility services to users. Cross-sector and cross-modal collaboration with road, rail, air and waterborne transport will be addressed, as well as supporting concrete steps for large-scale implementation and deployment. Experience from the CCAM Partnership and Europe’s Rail Joint Undertaking will be shared, alongside insights from related partnerships and initiatives, to explore how large-scale implementation can be supported across all modes. Panelists will discuss the next actions to be taken at EU level to make connected and automated mobility a reality for European citizens.
Moderator:
Karen Vancluysen (POLIS)
Rapporteur:
Peter Urban (RWTH Aachen University)
Speakers:
Christian Merkt (BMW)
Walter Struckl (Siemens Mobility)
Chrystelle Damar (SESAR JU)
Pieter Huyskens (Damen)
Pia Wijk (Einride)
Marzena Jougounoux (DG RTD)
This session explores how digitalisation can enable more efficient, sustainable, and resilient logistics across rail, road, air, and maritime transport. It addresses real-world challenges in multimodal coordination, where fragmentation still hinders performance and decarbonisation. Digital enablers, such as Artificial Intelligence, trusted data sharing frameworks, digital twins, smart connected assets and advanced connectivity, are discussed as integrated tools supporting adaptive planning, interoperability and automation. The session highlights concrete use cases and insights from infrastructure operators, industry experts and innovation initiatives (such as Intelligent Access), to identify practical priorities for future research and large-scale implementation towards Net-Zero Logistics over the next two years.
Moderator:
Paola Cossu (FIT Consulting)
Rapporteur:
Giuseppe Luppino (ALICE)
Speakers:
Wilhelm Patzner (CER Cargo)
Angelos Amditis (ICCS)
Lars Deiterding (HACON)
Szymon Oscislowski (DG MOVE)
Sascha Gill (United Waterways)
The potential of AI is increasingly being harnessed in the mobility sector, enabling smart mobility systems and solutions, increasing safety and efficiency. AI is gradually used in a diverse way: decision-support to autonomous action, detection of events, generation of synthetic data…
AI possesses some key characteristics for application in numerous transport related domains. For example, AI plays a key role in sustainable transport by optimizing fuel use and routing. Likewise, AI helps improve the efficiency of transport systems by optimising traffic and transport schedules and anticipating user demand patterns. AI can also facilitate proactive fleet upkeep by enabling predictive maintenance.
Yet, several avenues for research in AI and mobility remain to be explored: the use of AI to improve the synchronisation of fragmented infrastructure and transport modes by integrating data from different actors and transport operators, the deployment of AI driven charging network optimisation, the management of vulnerabilities created by the increased deployment of AI in smart mobility systems, the use of AI in validation and verification processes, especially the certification mission-critical applications, etc…
This session will present use cases of AI for smart mobility systems and identify priorities for future research and innovation in this sector.
Moderator:
Axel Volkery (DG MOVE)
Rapporteur:
Giovanni Circella (Uninversity of Ghent)
Speakers:
Elodie Petrozziello (EUI)
Margriet van Schijndel (TUE)
Francesco Flammini (University of Naples Federico II)
Maria Boile (CERTH)
Rita Somogyi (TERN)
15:30 – 17:00 Technical session 7
Rail-Enabled Last Mile: Simulating Parcel Flows via Urban Metro Networks for Carbon-Smart Logistics – Zisis Maleas, Georgia Ayfantopoulou, Sofoklis Dais, Pavlos Giannakou and Katerina Batzou (submission number 102)
Empirical evaluation of a simple matchmaking algorithm for freight carriers – Lorant Tavasszy, Michiel De Bok, Mahnam Saeednia, Merve Cebeci, Tangzhe Chen and Ron Van Duin (submission number 282)
A Modern and Sustainable Rail-Enabled Urban Logistics System and its Economic Evaluation – Dominic Kwakye Ampong, Libor Švadlenka, Molková Tatiana and Libor Bauer (submission number 1049)
Information Flow Modelling for Automated Freight Port Operations: Insights from Two Case Studies in Europe – Arkadiusz Drabicki, Filippos Adamidis, Ramandeep Singh, Karen Van Brussel, Dirk Staelens, Marco Mazzarino and Constantinos Antoniou (submission number 1495)
GREEN-LOG Logistics as a Service Marketplace: A policy-aligned marketplace for Sustainable Last-Mile Operations – Babis Magoutas, Amalia Bozinaki, Ioannis Tsouros, Francesca D’Alessandro, Joris Beckers, Panos Georgakis, Athena Tsirimpa, Konstantinos Barbopoulos and Vivian Kiousi (submission number 1509)
Agent-Based Simulation for Meal Micro-Delivery Services: Modeling, Simulation, and Dispatch Strategy Evaluation – Serkan Ozdemir, Lampros Yfantis, Gonçalo Homem de Almeida Rodriguez Correia and Shadi Sharif Azadeh (submission number 1570)
Levelling the Playing Field in EU Road Haulage: Enforcement Challenges and Early Lessons from Mobility Package I – Feyisayo Lari-Williams, Wouter Verheyen, Tim Breemersch and Bruno Van Zeebroeck (submission number 420)
Regulatory Divergence in Autonomous Vehicle Deployment: A comparative Study of the US, EU, and China – Carlos Luján Tutusaus, Justin Hidalgo Vélez, Oriol Flix Viñas and Nadia Martínez Sheikhi (submission number 818)
EU regulatory framework for transport and logistics: the path to low emissions, energy transition, and technology advancements through the ADMIRAL lens – Gabriel Dias, Elisabete Arsenio and Sofia Cerqueira (submission number 908)
Assessing the effectiveness of the EU passenger rights framework in the context of multimodal and smart mobility – Hai Anh Le (submission number 1007)
Comparative Analysis of Liability Frameworks for Automated Vehicles: Legal Readiness in the EU, US and China – Julia Roussou, Armira Kontaxi, Apostolos Ziakopoulos and George Yannis (submission number 1018)
Changing traffic regulation in Europe – impact of autonomous driving – Zsófia Farkas and Péter Gáspár (submission number 1504)
Special sessions
The rapid growth of e-commerce presents both challenges and opportunities for Europe’s transition toward climate-neutral, resource-efficient urban logistics. This session brings together researchers, industry leaders, and city stakeholders to explore sustainable e-commerce logistics and circular solutions. Topics include optimised return flows, reuse and repair models, zero-waste packaging, modular delivery systems, digital tools for managing returns, and improved recycling pathways. Participants will examine policy, behavioural, and technological strategies to decarbonise the e-commerce value chain, operationalise sustainability commitments, and foster collaboration through public–private partnerships, aiming to reduce emissions, waste, and inefficiencies at scale.
Digitalization is the broad transformation of societal and business models through the adoption and strategic integration of digital technologies. It is a key enabler to improve efficiencies, enhance customer experience, provide new opportunities and to enable automation, which results in a more agile and competitive organization. Furthermore, digitalisation will be critical for challenges related to increased labour shortage, international competition and geopolitical developments, the transition to a zero-emission waterborne sector, and the modal shift to waterborne transport. Over the past couple of years, digitalisation has found its way into the IWT and port sectors. This session will explore the state-of-play as regards digitalisation of these sectors, the next steps in terms of RD&I, as well as the further deployment of technologies. Special attention will be paid to the concept of regulatory sandboxes, critical to deploy digital technologies and concepts.