Meeting between Codatu and an official delegation from Shanghai

On Monday 20 October, Codatu’s General Delegate, Jean-Jacques Helluin, met with a large official delegation of 20 people from the Shanghai Municipal Transport Commission, who were visiting Lyon as part of a technical visit to France. The delegation was led by Mr. Qi DAI, Deputy Director General, and also included Mr. Wanyi XU, Director of the Shanghai Port and River Development Centre, and Mr. Jianfeng ZHU, Director General of the Project Management Centre, Pudong International Airport.

Shanghai is now the most populous city in China, with 28 million inhabitants. Its metro network, with 19 lines, is the most extensive in the world.

Discussions focused on 45 years of good and bad practices in urban mobility identified by Codatu around the world, which could be useful in China. The role of cars in the city, multi-level governance, sustainable financing of public transport operations, strategies for integrating paratransit, solutions for suburban mobility in the form of express buses or carpooling, and the link between land use planning and mobility planning were the main topics of interest to the Shanghai delegation.

Jean-Jacques Helluin invited Mr Qi Dai to visit Abidjan for the #CIMDC2026 conference in October 2026 to share Shanghai’s experience with African authorities. Special thanks to Mr Tay Keolouangkhot (President of the Maison de l’Asie) and Ms Jing Lala (President of the Chinese Association of Lyon and the Region and Lyon Director of the IEAM, Institute of Administration and Management Studies) for facilitating the meeting and providing simultaneous translation!