Market consultation: Digital Twin for local authorities: predicting environmental and mobility impacts.

To gather the right insights for one or more successful public procurement procedures, we are organising an open market consultation. We invite companies, research centres, universities, technology providers, engineering and consultancy firms, data providers and open-source communities to jointly explore solution directions, assess technical and organisational feasibility, and identify risks, dependencies and success factors. The plenary session of the market consultation will take place on 25 September 2026 in Brussels at the Marie Belpaire Building.

Who are we looking for?

We are looking for market players and organisations that can develop, deliver, integrate, validate or operationally support one or more components of the future system. We are particularly interested in expertise and solutions related to:

• User portal and scenario editor: map-based configuration of study areas and measures;
• Mobility modelling and calculation engines: strategic and local traffic models, multimodal demand modelling, route and mode choice, static or dynamic allocation, second-order effects, fast indicative methods and more in-depth runs;
• Geodata and local network refinement: GIS conflation, topological validation, enrichment of strategic networks with local roads, connectors, zonal disaggregation and spatial allocation keys;
• Mobility data and calibration: traffic counts, VDV-compatible data ingestion, historical and current traffic data, travel times, OD and telecom data;
• Data alignment and API integration with environmental models: translation of raw vehicle performance data into the required input format, mapping of fleet and vehicle categories, time and reference year corrections, and technical API integration with the environmental model;
• Public transport and multimodal operations: integration of public transport networks, timetables, timetable-based and headway-based modelling.

Do you have expertise in one of these domains, do you offer a (partial) solution, or can you bring together several building blocks as an integrator or consortium? Then we warmly encourage you to register. Parties outside the traditional mobility or public-sector market are also welcome.

Project goal

The PIP-project “Digital Twin for local authorities: predicting environmental and mobility impacts” aims to give local authorities access to a reliable, scalable and understandable digital decision-support tool for mobility and liveability policy. The future solution should enable local authorities to select a study area and baseline situation, configure measures, choose an appropriate calculation mode and interpret integrated mobility and environmental results. More specifically, the intended solution should:

• provide a user-friendly and interactive web interface for scenario creation, comparison, visualisation and reporting;
• support the transition from strategic and regional models to sufficiently fine-grained local analyses;
• automate and make controllable, as far as possible, network enrichment, spatial disaggregation, mapping and data preparation;
• calculate route choice, modal choice, congestion, rat-running and other relevant first- and second-order effects;
• provide a tiered calculation strategy;
• enable controlled integration of local data for calibration and plausibility checks;
• automatically and reproducibly translate vehicle performance data and other mobility results into the required input for environmental models;
• be modular, interoperable and extensible;
• be scalable and manageable for use by local authorities across Flanders.

The market consultation should help determine which components are already commercially available today, which components require further development or validation, which combinations of technologies appear promising, and how (a) future procurement(s) can be realistically scoped.

Purpose and approach of the market consultation

During the market consultation, dMOW and VMM will explain the current situation, user needs, functional requirements, technical challenges and guiding solution principles. We will then discuss interactively how these needs can be matched with existing or future solutions available on the market. Among other things, we aim to gain insight into:

• the commercial availability and maturity of market-ready partial solutions and integrated platforms;
• feasible architecture variants and the distinction between reuse, configuration, integration and new development;
• alternatives and additions to existing traffic modelling and assignment software;
• the feasibility and quality assurance of local network refinement, conflation and disaggregation;
• feasible calculation times and quality differences between indicative, simplified and full calculation modes;
• interoperability between mobility models, geodata, local data and environmental calculation engines;
• licensing, data, cloud and operating models that are scalable for local authorities;
• the division of roles between government, system integrator, specialised suppliers, knowledge partners and end users;
• realistic lead times, cost structures, development risks and validation or pilot strategies;
• possible procurement lots, forms of cooperation and consortium formation.

To ensure a smooth and substantive discussion, we ask organisations to preferably be represented by one or two staff members with technical, scientific, product, architecture or implementation expertise.

The market consultation consists of:

1. a public, physical plenary market consultation on 25 September 2026 in Brussels;
2. optional online one-to-one meetings of approximately 20 minutes on 7 or 8 October 2026, to be selected upon registration.

The outcome of the market consultation should enable dMOW and VMM to further define the solution scope, architecture, validation approach and procurement strategy.

In accordance with the principles of equality and transparency, a public report of the market consultation will be prepared, with due respect for confidential information. PIP will provide the report to the participants and make it publicly available via the PIO website. To stay informed, we recommend subscribing to the PIP newsletter via the green button on the PIP website.

The sole purpose of the market consultation is to gather the necessary information in preparation for one or more possible public procurement procedures; it does not form part of such procedure(s). The market consultation does not imply any obligation to actually launch a procurement procedure. Participation or non-participation in this market consultation will in no way have a negative or positive impact on the possibility of participating in any future public procurement procedure(s) following the market consultation.

Programme

• 09:00 – 09:30    Welcome and coffee
• 09:30 – 09:40    Welcome and practical information
• 09:40 – 10:00    Introduction to the project by dMOW and VMM
• 10:00 – 10:10    Brief introduction to the Innovative Public Procurement Programme (VLAIO–PIO)
• 10:10 – 10:50    Current situation, user needs and desired user workflow
• 10:50 – 11:05    Break
• 11:05 – 12:15    Interactive discussion 1: mobility modelling, local network refinement, data and calibration
• 12:15 – 13:00    Lunch and informal exchange
• 13:00 – 14:10    Interactive discussion 2: technical solution directions (mobility modelling, environmental integration, data, calculation modes, interoperability, architecture, cloud, APIs, etc.)
• 14:10 – 14:25    Break
• 14:25 – 15:25    Interactive discussion 3: set-up of the Proof of Concept (PoC)
• 15:25 – 16:05    Round table: public-private cooperation and open ecosystem
• 16:05 – 16:25    Summary, open questions and next steps
• 16:25 – 16:30    End

Where and when?

The physical market consultation will take place on 25 September 2026, from 09:00 to 16:30, at the Marie-Elisabeth Belpaire Building, Simon Bolivarlaan 17, 1000 Brussels. The exact meeting room will be communicated at a later stage.

In principle, the workshop will be held in Dutch. If international participants who do not understand Dutch are present, the market consultation may be organised partly or entirely in English.

The optional one-on-one meetings will take place online on 7 and 8 October 2026. Selected time slots and practical instructions will be confirmed after registration.

Participation is free of charge, but interested parties must register by 21 September 2026 at the latest.