Bologna rewards ‘green’ travel with free beer

Travellers in the Italian city of Bologna are being incentivised to give up their cars with the offer of beer, ice cream or cinema tickets. An anti-pollution initiative rewards people who cycle, walk or take public transport. A hundred local businesses have signed up to the programme – called Bella Mossa (or ‘Good Job’) - to give away discount vouchers, the BBC reports. Funded by the European Union and Bologna’s local government, Bella Mossa runs for six months of the year. Users download an app, log thei
November 1, 2018 Read time: 2 mins
Travellers in the Italian city of Bologna are being incentivised to give up their cars with the offer of beer, ice cream or cinema tickets.


An anti-pollution initiative rewards people who cycle, walk or take public transport. A hundred local businesses have signed up to the programme – called Bella Mossa (or ‘Good Job’) - to give away discount vouchers, the %$Linker: 2 External <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?><dictionary /> 0 0 0 link-external BBC reports false https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p06pjwck false false%>.

Funded by the European Union and Bologna’s local government, Bella Mossa runs for six months of the year. Users download an app, log their sustainable journeys and exchange the points they receive for goods.

Points are based on distance travelled, with a GPS tracker ensuring people are using the mode of transport which they say they are. You can only log four ‘green’ journeys per day – which means you have to keep using the app over time to build up points.

Urban planner Marco Amadori set up Bella Mossa in 2017 to make sustainable transport attractive: “For the first time we have been able to involve all people,” he said. “Everybody will have the possibility to change a car trip into a bike trip or into a bus trip and be able to get some discount for his good behaviour.”

Last year the app recorded 3.7 million sustainable journeys in Bologna, with 16,000 reward vouchers claimed, says the BBC’s Amelia Hemphill.

Related Content

  • Volkswagen tests Level 4 AVs in Hamburg
    April 17, 2019
    Volkswagen Research is testing autonomous vehicles (AVs) at SAE Level 4 in real driving conditions in the German city of Hamburg. The announcement comes as the fall-out from VW’s ‘Dieselgate’ nightmare – when the company was found to have programmed turbocharged direct injection diesel engines to activate their emissions controls for laboratory tests - putters on. This week the company’s former chief executive Martin Winterkorn was charged with fraud for his involvement. But VW has admitted that the scan
    Read More
  • Didi Chuxing issues public apology for death of female passenger
    September 3, 2018
    Chinese ride-sharing company Didi Chuxing has blamed its own ‘vanity’ for lapses in safety which led to the rape and killing of a 20-year-old female passenger. The firm issued a public apology for the incident which took place on 28 August and says it will now prioritise safety over growth. In an emailed statement, Didi founder Cheng Wei and president Jean Liu say: "We see clearly this is because our vanity overtook our original belief. We raced non-stop, riding on the force of breathless expansion and
    Read More
  • Zero-emission transport at centre of Democrat ‘Green New Deal’
    February 13, 2019
    Clean and affordable transportation and zero-emission vehicle infrastructure are at the heart of the US Democrats’ ‘Green New Deal’ package. The proposals seek to move the US away from fossil fuels and other sources of emissions that cause global warming within the next decade. The package says these goals can be reached by reached by a ten-year “national mobilisation” which include an overhaul in transportation systems to eliminate pollution and greenhouse as much as technologically feasible, repai
    Read More
  • Report calls for per-mile road charging scheme in London
    April 30, 2019
    London’s mayor Sadiq Khan has been urged to replace the city’s existing road charge schemes with a single system that charges drivers per mile. Called City Move, the scheme would apply in areas of high demand and poor air quality. Rates would vary by vehicle emissions, local levels of congestion and pollution and availability of public transport alternatives – but would be set before the journey begins. A report by thinktank Centre for London - Green Light: Next Generation of Road User Charging for a Hea
    Read More

Highlighted Content