Experiential PPPs powering healthy mobility projects

Bristol, London and Milan are the first cities to benefit from new private-public partnerships (PPPs) enabled by out-of-home communications company PosterScope.

PosterScope’s new Urban Partnerships initiative brings together brands, local authorities and local communities for a series of projects aimed at enriching the lives of citizens.

The mayor’s office in Milan teamed up with Microsoft to create 60 digital islands around the city, London’s Tower Hamlets partnered Adidas on a lit running track and the British Heart Foundation and London & Partners launched a walking tour of the capital dubbed the London Heart Trail.

“Cuts continue to be made to local authority budgets so they are increasingly looking for commercial funding,” said Michael Brown, Managing Director of PosterScope’s experiential division psLive.

Brown believes lack of funding combined with the rise of the experiential economy, brands’ desire to provide content rather than advertising and citizens’ craving for a “kinder, fairer, smarter, greener and more sustainable society” creates the perfect environment for these projects.

The UK city of Bristol has teamed up with online cycle retailer Wiggle to install free bike pumps at bus stops. Similarly, Adidas installed sports pitches in the London Borough of Lambeth and a lit running track in Tower Hamlets.

The running track facilitated safe running for women at night, while promoting the launch of an Adidas women’s running shoe. Energy for the nighttime lighting was generated by kinetic energy from people’s footsteps.

Working with the British Heart Foundation and London & Partners, the Urban Partnerships team helped launch the London Heart Trail, an interactive walk along the South Bank, from the London Eye to Tower Bridge that provided information on how to keep your heart healthy.

Many of these projects tie in with ‘smart city’ developments. For example, the bank Santander reinforced its sponsorship of London’s shared bikes scheme by feeding real-time data from bike docking stations to screens at bus stops telling people how far the nearest bikes were and how many were available.

The partnerships are not limited to the UK or to mobility initiatives. PosterScope helped Milan link up with Microsoft after the mayor declared his ambition to make the city the most digitally connected in Europe. Microsoft created 60 digital islands with free wi-fi, mobile charging points, touchscreen local information and electric car charging equipment.

“This provides a space for brands to do something genuinely meaningful rather than just paying lip service to the notion of social wellbeing,” said Brown. “It should be a win-win-win scenario for the brands, local authorities and local communities.”