Supporting the urban development in Chișinău
Chișinău is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Moldova and the country’s main industrial and commercial centre and transportation hub. While still being the least urbanised European country with over 55% of the population residing in rural areas (as of 2014), particularly Chișinău is expected to be faced with a strong inflow of new residents putting even more pressure on city’s infrastructure and services. Thus, the management of the urbanisation and rural-urban migration process has been gaining attention as one of the key national development priorities.
Both the Government of Moldova and the Municipality of Chișinău are interested in understanding the urban development patterns and in co-designing safe-to-fail experimental solutions to solve emerging problems or anticipate what might happen in the next 5–10 years. This has been the main justification for kicking-off the development of an Urban Mobility Plan for the city, supported by UNDP Moldova as part of the Moldova Sustainable Green Cities Project funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF).
To support in the development of the Urban Mobility Plan, UNDP Moldova has requested Earth observation (EO) support from ESA’s EO Clinic, a rapid-response mechanism for small-scale and exploratory uses of satellite EO information in support of a wide range of activities specific to international development. GeoVille, together with its partners from SIRS, analysed the Chișinău urban expansion patterns and types over time, identified typical day- and night-time distributions of the population and their mobility behaviour, the portion of the population that has convenient access to public transport as well as determined current infrastructure gaps. The analysis was performed by integrating non-EO data, e.g. mobility data provided by Orange Moldova. Work is underway to also include electricity consumption data and quality of life indicators collected from the local population through micronarratives.
A roll-out to the entire Municipality of Chișinău is currently planned!
