Successful EuroVelo 13 project draws to a close
The end of September marked the close of the eighteen-month EuroVelo 13 project, which has involved partners in eight countries along the northern half of the Iron Curtain Trail. The partners can look back on some notable achievements, including a completed EuroVelo13.com website and brand new cycle tourism package offers.
Vidzeme Tourism Association has been a partner in this project and, together with Latvian Tourism Development Agency, created several packages along the EuroVelo 13 route in Latvia. Also, a new European Commission project on EuroVelo 13 (EV13ICTE) has begun on September 19, and will last for 18 month. The main focus in the project will be the development of a new mobile application for EuroVelo 13 route.
Over the past year and a half we have been providing regular updates on the progress with the EuroVelo 13 Project, which is co-financed by the EU through the COSME Programme. The project came to an end in September having more than met its objectives. The main outputs in the project’s work packages were:
EuroVelo 13 Product Development
The preparation of over 50 national and transnational tourism packages, over 20 of which are available on the market and some of them already been sold. The package offers vary in what they include but all of them are designed to give participants an opportunity to cycle some of the most developed sections of the northern part of the Iron Curtain Trail. It is possible to view some of the packages that have been taken up by the market using the links below:
Estonia: http://www.citybike.ee/ / cyclistswelcome.ee
Lithuania: http://www.bbtravel.lt/
Poland: polska.travel/rower/weekend-na-dwoch-kolkach-na-szlaku-eurovelo/
Germany (TH):
Travel Butler:
http://www.radfahren-in-thueringen.info/de/radreisen-grenzlanderfahrung
Haus des Volkes/Probstzella:
http://www.probstzella.de/probstzella1/index.php?id=503#nirvana
Czech Republic: eurovelo.cz / www.ccrjm.cz
Austria: http://www.weinviertel.at/iron-curtain-trail / www.niederoesterreich.at
EuroVelo 13 Promotion
EV13 price winner B
This work package focused on communication and promotion. As part of this work, the transnational website www.EuroVelo13.com was completed to cover the northern section of the route. Web marketing was used to promote the website once it had been completed in the form of two Facebook games that were run over the summer. The prizes included one of the tourism packages on the Lithuanian section of EuroVelo 13 and a complete set of maps relating to the route in the Czech Republic.
National and regional websites were developed/improved to include more information on the route too. For example:
Finland: outdoorsfinland.com / http://eurovelo13finland.blogspot.fi/
Estonia: cyclistswelcome.ee
Latvia: latvia.travel/lv/eurovelo-13
Poland: poland.travel/en/cycling
Germany: http://adfc-mv.de/projekte-kampagnen/iron-curtain-trail.html / http://www.adfc-thueringen.de/Projekte/ict.html
http://adfc-sachsen-anhalt.de/thema/ict/
Czech Republic: eurovelo.cz / www.ccrjm.cz
Austria: weinviertel.at/iron-curtain-trail /
Many other activities were organised as part of this work package, including: study tours were run for journalists and bloggers to invite them to experience and then write about the route; the partners promoted the Iron Curtain Trail at various tourism fairs (such as the ITB Berlin – the world’s leading travel trade fair); social media campaigns and radio promotions were run in Poland; professional photo shoots produced a high quality image library and roll up banners were produced to help promote the route at future events.
EuroVelo 13 Public and Private Partnerships
The final work package sought to ensure the sustainability of the project results by developing partnerships between key public and private actors. To this end, national and regional workshops and conferences were organised by most of the partners, in addition to focused bilateral meetings. It is hoped that the the connections established through these events will ensure that EuroVelo 13 – Iron Curtain Trail continues to go from strength to strength.
Republsihed from EuroVelo.com