Street Moves

‘Street Moves’ is an innovative project transforming our shared urban streets through design. Working in collaboration with municipalities, design teams, and citizens, ‘Street Moves’ crafts novel street solutions while developing place-specific methods and tools. This enhances the adaptability of the stakeholders involved.

Street Moves is run by ArkDes and funded by Vinnova, Sweden’s innovation agency, as part of the mission to make all Swedish streets sustainable, healthy, and full of life by 2030. Sweden aims to meet the goals of Agenda 2030 and achieve net-zero fossil fuel emissions by 2045. In this effort, public actors are expected to lead by example. We need new tools to test what works, and we need to act quickly. Street Moves utilizes site-specific, inclusive, and exploratory design processes to test new ways to meet these challenges and design street spaces not centered around cars.

The project kicked off in the spring of 2020. During that spring and summer, ArkDes and LundbergDesign ↗ co-designed a modular street solution. These modules, trialled in Stockholm, Gothenburg, and Helsingborg, consist of a glulam base plate with customizable parts ranging from electric scooter parking to outdoor gyms, seating areas, and planting boxes. The project has since expanded to more municipalities across Sweden. Lessons and methodologies from earlier Street Moves’ processes are continuously integrated for more effective outcomes.

To date, ‘Street Moves’ has revolutionized street spaces in collaboration with seven municipalities: Hultsfred, Härnösand, Södertälje, Gothenburg, Helsingborg, Umeå, and Stockholm. The success of these efforts led to the trial of Street Moves’ methods in San Jose, California, in November 2023.

‘Street Moves’ offers a rapid, cost-effective approach to transforming street spaces without disruptive roadwork. It fosters a multi-stakeholder dialogue about the future design of streets. Temporary street solutions, driven by community engagement and feedback, enable the exploration of public demand and the testing of concepts through street prototypes. This incremental approach is revolutionizing our shared urban streets, one at a time, towards achieving a sustainable, healthy, and lively urban landscape across Sweden.