SYNCHROMODE Showcased at 16th ITS European Congress in Seville 

SYNCHROMODE was featured at the 16th ITS European Congress, held from 19 to 21 May 2025 in Seville, Spain. The event brought together experts, innovators, and stakeholders in the field of Intelligent Transport Systems to explore the latest advances in mobility and traffic management. 

SYNCHROMODE participated in the strategic session SIS56: “Next Generation Multimodal Traffic Management – Results and Roadmap”, held on Wednesday, 21 May. The session highlighted innovative solutions from three major EU-funded projects: ACUMEN, DELPHI_EU, and SYNCHROMODE, focusing on how research outcomes are being translated into real-world tools for managing multimodal passenger and freight traffic.

A key outcome of the session was the presentation of the “Multimodal Traffic Management: Roadmap for 2030 and Beyond”, a forward-looking document developed by the Multimodal Traffic Management Cluster (MTMC), in which SYNCHROMODE is an active member. The roadmap outlines strategic directions for sustainable, data-driven transport systems across Europe. 

In addition to the main session, the SYNCHROMODE Toolbox was presented during Technical Paper Session TP28, titled “Getting Value from Mobility Data”. The Toolbox offers practical applications for leveraging mobility data to optimize multimodal transport planning and operations. 

SYNCHROMODE extends its sincere thanks to the speakers who contributed to the sessions: 

The project team also expresses its gratitude to #ITSCongresses and the organizer Dimitris Tzanis, from Centre for Research and Technology Hellas, as well as the moderator Sergio Escriba from CINEA for their support in organizing and facilitating this high-impact event. 

SYNCHROMODE General assembly in barcelona

The SYNCHROMODE partners gathered in Barcelona for a 2-day meeting of productive discussions about the project’s progress and next steps. 

This General Assembly was held in Castelldefels, close to Barcelona, on 28 & 29 May 2025. 

KEY HIGHLIGHTS:

The General Assembly began with valuable insights on project management from Dimitris Tzanis (CERTH), the project coordinator. His presentation covered a range of topics including administrative matters, coordination, innovation management, data management, and ethics. 

The day then focused on the integration and testing of the SYNCHROMODE solutions within the case studies. We received updates from the teams in Madrid, Thessaloniki, and South Holland, who shared the status of their tasks and deliverables, current challenges, and next steps. 

South Holland provided an interesting overview of their plans to manage traffic during sunny days near Keukenhof. Madrid discussed some of the difficulties they are experiencing with data provision and the alternative solutions they are exploring. Finally, Thessaloniki conducted a live demonstration of the toolbox, sharing their screens to show how traffic can be monitored across different trajectories and specific time slots. 

In the afternoon, project partners YUNEX, VMZ, and CERTH provided more details on the lessons learned and progress made regarding the implementation and testing of SYNCHROMODE solutions. Various components of the system were tested within different modules, taking into account their impacts on key factors such as user acceptance, safety, and KPIs. 

CERTH elaborated on the impact assessment approach, explaining how data collected during the execution phase will be used to evaluate the effectiveness of the toolbox. The SYNCHROMODE toolbox is expected to contribute to important goals such as improving road safety, reducing traffic congestion and pollutant emissions, shortening journey times, and encouraging policymaker engagement. Each of these anticipated impacts will be assessed across social, economic, and environmental KPIs. 

An engaging discussion emerged around how to define and measure these impacts in each case study. For example, partners explored ways to calculate public transport occupancy rates and interpret their relevance within the broader evaluation framework. Clearly, this represents an additional challenge for the SYNCHROMODE team! 

Day 1 concluded with a pleasant seaside dinner, offering partners the opportunity to network and exchange ideas in a more informal setting. 

On the second day, we began with a presentation by PNO on business modelling and exploitation strategy. The discussion focused on the commercial potential of SYNCHROMODE services and how to bridge the gap between research outcomes and real market conditions. A first workshop on the exploitation strategy is already planned for September 2025! 

This was followed by a presentation from RUPPRECHT on Work Package 2 (WP2), which focused on user needs, system requirements, governance structures, cooperation models, and decision-making frameworks. Building on the results from the case studies and the impact assessment, a further analysis of governance and cooperation models will be conducted. 

NOMMON then presented the current status of data gathering, fusion, and analysis. This was followed by UCL’s session on modelling, simulation, and the prediction of multimodal transport solutions. 

After lunch, UCL continued with a presentation on predicting disruptions and traffic conditions. Accurate traffic state prediction is crucial for effective traffic flow management, especially during peak hours or in the event of accidents. For this purpose, a dedicated predictive model has been developed. 

Finally, DEUSTO presented the transport network optimization tasks, along with the design of optimization methods across the different modules. A first prototype has already been developed for most categories of optimization problems. Testing scenarios for preliminary results will be implemented in three carefully selected villages in the southwest region of Madrid. DEUSTO showcased comparisons between baseline scenarios and optimized schedules, clearly highlighting the improvements. 

The second day concluded with a Steering Committee meeting involving CERTH, DEUSTO, YUNEX, PZH, and UCL. 

A special thank you to AIMSUN for hosting and organizing this successful gathering! We are already looking forward to the next meeting and to continuing our collective efforts toward smarter, more integrated traffic management solutions. 

SYNCHROMODE mid-term review  

On 4 March 2025, the European Commission and SYNCHROMODE partners gathered for the project’s mid-term review, encompassing the first period of the project from the beginning to October 2024.  

The project coordinators Evangelos Mitsakis and Dimitris Tzanis presented the activities carried out so far and outlined the planned next steps. The session provided an opportunity to take stock of the progress made and to adjust the planning to ensure successful delivery of the results. 

The good news is that SYNCHROMODE is on track and committed to making this project a success! 

When it comes to dissemination and communication, SYNCHROMODE has participated in 15 events in total since the beginning, with 2 international events at the ITS in Dubai and TRB AM in Washington D.C.  

It is also part of the Multimodal Traffic Management Cluster, which meets regularly to facilitate peer exchange, promote joint project visibility at events, and organize interactive sessions. We are one of the main contributors to the Cluster’s strategic roadmap and serve as a leading partner within the initiative. 

In terms of publications, 4 have been accepted during this period, while several other abstracts have already been submitted and are pending positive outcomes. And there’s more to come! 

Several core components of the SYNCHROMODE Toolbox have already been developed and deployed, including the Data Quality Tool, which assesses real-time and historical data from multiple sources; the Trajectories Analytics module, which extracts traffic patterns from floating car data; the Public Transport Service KPIs module, which monitors and estimates public transport service quality; and the Prediction Module, which integrates machine learning models to forecast traffic states and support proactive decision-making. 

At the same time, additional modules are under active development. These focus on ensuring resilient multimodal network traffic management during both planned and unplanned events, leveraging advanced simulation techniques and state-of-the-art optimization methods to support integrated and dynamic traffic management strategies. 

RTR Conference and Multimodal Traffic Management Cluster meeting 

SYNCHROMODE participated in two relevant events in Brussels in February 2025: the RTR Conference and the Multimodal Traffic Management Cluster meeting (MTMC).  

The RTR Conference – standing for Results for Road transport Research – has taken place from 11 to 13 February 2025 in Brussels. Organised by the European Commission, it aimed at showcasing the progress and impacts of EU-funded road transport projects, covering key areas such as green vehicles, urban mobility, logistics, intelligent transport systems, safety, and automated vehicles. The Conference has featured 26 sessions, 92 projects and 100 speakers, among which SYNCHROMODE! 

Indeed, on 13 February, SYNCHROMODE had the chance to participate in the afternoon session together with ACUMEN Project and DELPHI_EU project, delving into multimodal traffic management for door-to-door transport of passengers and freight. Dimitris Tzanis from CERTH has provided valuable insights about the project activities and progress. 

This Conference not only allowed to showcase the project, but also engaging with stakeholders, exchange ideas, identify synergies and incorporate lessons learned into our work.  

The Multimodal Traffic Management Cluster met on 12 February 2025 for a fruitful session. MTMC is a collaborative initiative involving seven EU-funded Horizon Europe research projects under the topic of Multimodal Traffic Management (MTM), including: FRONTIER, TANGENT, ORCHESTRA, DIT4TraM, SYNCHROMODE, ACUMEN, and DELPHI. It is dedicated to facilitating multimodal network and traffic management shaping the future of multimodal mobility in Europe. 

During the session, the projects have presented their use cases along with their technology progress and readiness levels. Useful lessons learnt have been shared as well from past projects such as TANGENT, FRONTIER, Orchestra2020 and DIT4TraM. 

This in-person meeting also dived into a session on potential synergies of case studies and possibilities for cross testing and evaluation of the different solutions developed between projects. 

The cluster’s project officer Thiago Tavares opened the session and Tiffany Vlemmings from DGMOVE provided an overview of the current policy framework and legislative context of the upcoming working program to set the scene on how our projects can inform the policy. In addition, she provided the representatives of the projects with information about the priorities and initiatives on behalf of the new Commissioner for Sustainable Transport and Tourism European Commission  

SYNCHROMODE and the MTM cluster together, are driving forward transformative and innovative solutions to meet the evolving demands of future multimodal mobility. 

Follow the journey of the MTM Cluster on LinkedIn.

Multimodal Traffic Management between the tulips!

The Keukenhof season of 2025 has just started, which means SYNCHROMODE partners will start implementing the first PoC for Multimodal Traffic Management around Keukenhof.

We will be testing two predictive modules:

Throughout the season, all relevant stakeholders will have access to two advanced tools provided via the Synchromode project:

Additionally, MAPtm’s Traffic Management Centre, VCMAP, will use both dashboards to supply stakeholders with daily monitoring of network performance, special events, public transport conditions, and the quality of the predictions. This comprehensive approach enables continuous improvement in operations throughout the season.

New research publication for SYNCHROMODE: “A Data-Driven Decision Support System for Multimodal Network and Traffic Management” 

The SYNCHROMODE Project has been part of the publication of a research paper in this early spring 2025. The paper, titled “A Data-Driven Decision Support System for Multimodal Network and Traffic Management – SYNCHROMODE’, has been published in the conference proceedings “Climate Crisis and resilient transportation System, Lecture Notes in Intelligent Transportation and Infrastructure”, Springer editions, of the 7th Conference on Sustainable Mobility, CSuM2024. 

The paper highlights the role of innovative and disruptive technologies as well as new mobility solutions to tackle the challenges defining the transport network and traffic management. Indeed, the European transportation network is facing significant challenges including traffic congestion, safety concerns, greenhouse gas emissions and associated costs.  

To address these issues, SYNCHROMODE develops a data-driven decision support system aimed at enhancing multimodal network and traffic management.  

The paper presents the development process for this system, which incorporates the data quality assessment, the modelling and simulation of multimodal transport, traffic prediction, network optimization techniques, and definition of novel multimodal Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). 

The proposed system facilitates the prediction and optimization of multi-modal transport supply and demand data, the instantaneous and effective reaction to and management of various types of events, both planned and un-planned, as well as the communication and coordination of the various in-volved actors. The practicality and effectiveness of elements of this toolbox will lead to the creation of three distinct services, and specifically those of: 

  • Network-wide data exchange and integration 
  • Cooperative dashboard for real-time monitoring and prediction of network-wide multimodal transport and traffic, and  
  • Resilient multimodal transport network and traffic management support tool.  

The services of the SYNCHROMODE Toolbox will be assessed in three case studies in Greece (Thessaloniki), the Netherlands, and Spain (Madrid), emphasising their potential to transform the transport network and traffic management across Europe. 

In the paper, you will find the project’s objectives and scope, the methodology, the case studies applications as well as the challenges faced, and lessons learnt during the first year of the project. 

The authors Evangelos Mitsakis, Dimitris Tzanis, Viktoria Petkani, Alexandros Dolianitis, Evangelos Mintsis, Areti Kotsi & Vasileios Psonis are affiliated to the Centre for Research and Technology Hellas – Hellenic Institute of Transport in Thessaloniki, Greece. 

Access the publication and the full paper here: A Data-Driven Decision Support System for Multimodal Network and Traffic Management – SYNCHROMODE | SpringerLink