On 22 September 2020, the new EU founded project “Transdanube.Travel.Stories” was presented during an online kick-off conference. The project, which started in July 2020, focuses on the implementation of new promotion concepts and sustainable mobility management tools to support sustainable tourism in the Danube region.

Among its partners, the project counts five Cultural Routes of the Council of Europe: Saint Martin of Tours Route, European Route of Jewish Heritage, Iter Vitis Route, Réseau Art Nouveau Network and Roman Emperors and Danube Wine Route.

The kick-off conference was held online by the Environment Agency Austria (Unweltbundesamt) and the Federal Ministry for Climate Action, Environment, Energy, Mobility, Innovation and Technology. Mr. Stefano DOMINIONI, Executive Secretary of the Enlarged Partial Agreement on Cultural Routes of the Council of Europe (EPA) and Director of the European Institute of Cultural Routes, gave a keynote speech at the conference, illustrating the importance of the Danube region for the Cultural Routes of the Council of Europe. The other two keynote speakers were Mr. Georg STEINER (Tourism Director, Linz Tourist Board), presenting the current European and Danube narrative, and Mrs. Petra RIFFERT (Secretary General, Danube.Pearls Network), giving an insight on sustainable tourism mobility management.

The Transdanube.Travel.Stories project aims to develop new narratives about the region, connecting the stories of single destinations and routes into more extensive narratives, which create a sense of common heritage and shared values within the Danube region. Moreover, the main goals of the project are to create innovative tools to promote these new narratives and to develop guidelines and trainings for the involved networks and partners. It is also planned to establish mobility programmes for routes managers and networks as well as mobility centers at selected destinations.

The partners of the project are :

• the Environment Agency Austria (Federal Ministry of Agriculture, Regions and Tourism);
• the Danube Office Ulm/Neu-Ulm (Germany) and the WGD Danube Upper Austria Tourist Board (Austria) representing the Danube Pearls Network;
• the Linz Tourist Board (Austria);
• the West Pannon Regional and Economic Development Public Nonprofit Ltd. (Hungary) representing the Saint Martin of Tours Route;
• the Institute for Culture, Tourism and Sport of Murska Sobota (Slovenia) representing the European Route of Jewish Heritage;
• the Croatian Association for Tourism and Rural Development (“The Village Membership Club”, Croatia) representing the Iter Vitis Route;
• the Association for the Promotion of Tourism in Oradea and its Region (Romania) representing the Réseau Art Nouveau Network;
• the Danube Competence Center (DCC, Serbia) representing the Roman Emperors and Danube Wine Route;
• DANUBEPARKS - Danube River Network of Protected Areas. (Austria).

The project, funded by the European Interreg Danube Transnational Programme, is planned to run until 31 December 2022, and has a total budget of 1.82 Million Euros.