Best practice and sharing

Learning from each other and sharing what works

A big part of the Citizens’ Rail was about developing and sharing best practice. Our partners were keen to share methods that have proved successful and lessons that have been learned, so that other practitioners can adapt our approaches and apply them in their own local area.

Explore the resources produced as part of the project below…

Resources we produced

Toolkit

We developed a toolkit (available in English, French and German) to provide inspiration, advice and guidance on how to implement community rail projects.
Evaluation

As part of the toolkit, RWTH Aachen University and the University of Central Lancashire produced an in-depth guide to evaluating community rail projects.
Network

To enable collaboration and learning to continue beyond the duration of the Citizens’ Rail project, we created the Community Rail Cafe, our growing online network. Perhaps you would like to join?
Workshops

We held a programme of Citizens’ Rail workshops to develop thinking and share best practice around key themes of the project.
Conference

Our final conference was held in October 2015 – watch the video and see the slides from our expert speakers. An attendee from SusTrans described it as “the best conference I’ve ever attended”.

Student masterclasses


Masterclass I: An international, multi-disciplinary group of nearly 50 students came together in Aachen and neighbouring Heerlen in October 2013 to learn, collaborate and plan solutions for Citizens’ Rail stations. Find out more and view the students’ presentations.

Masterclass II: In March 2015, students from our partner countries again came together, this time in Preston, UK. They developed new ways to promote rail travel and increase usage of local and regional lines. Find out more and view the students’ presentations.