Experts
Dr. Oliver Wittig
Partner, Head of Public Commercial Law, EY Law GmbH
Born in 1967, after completing a commercial apprenticeship, he studied law at the Universities of Münster and Heidelberg. He completed his doctorate there in 1999 on a topic relating to European, constitutional and public procurement law. From 1998 to 2011, Wittig worked for MVV Energie AG and Rhein-Neckar-Verkehr GmbH. After working for a major international law firm between 2011 and 2015, he became a partner and head of public law and public commercial law at EY Law GmbH in 2015. There, he also heads the legal advice for the public sector. Oliver Wittig has been involved with public transport and cable cars for many years. In 2022/2023, Wittig and his team assisted in the only state aid coordination in Germany concerning the financing of a cable car integrated into public transport. In addition, his team is currently assisting with the awarding of cable car control services. He is a part-time lecturer at the Baden-Württemberg Cooperative State University and the VDV Academy as well as the author of numerous publications, in particular on local public transport.
Day 1 | Mobility Lab
Dr. Tim Hagenbruch
Senior Associate, Public Commercial Law, EY Law GmbH
Born in 1988, after studying law at the Universities of Freiburg and Heidelberg, he completed his legal clerkship at the Regional Court of Mannheim. He then worked as a lawyer for EY Law from 2015 to 2019, specialising in public transport law, state aid law and public procurement law. From 2016 to 2019, he completed his doctorate at the University of Heidelberg on a topic related to state aid and public procurement law. After working in the legal department of a chemical company, he returned to EY Law in 2020 and has been working as a lawyer at the Mannheim office ever since. Tim Hagenbruch has dealt extensively with state aid aspects of cable car financing. In particular, he was involved in what is, as far as can be ascertained, Germany's only state aid coordination with the European Commission regarding the financing of a cable car integrated into local public transport.
Day 2 | Mobility Lab
Daniel Mangold
Managing Director, Melzer & Hopfner Ingenieurgesellschaft mbH & Co.KG
Daniel Mangold enjoyed his training as an industrial engineer - with a focus on mechanical engineering - at the higher technical federal teaching and research institute in Bregenz (Austria) and graduated successfully in 2006. After 13 years of professional experience in the field of ropeway project planning and sales at a well-known ropeway manufacturer, Daniel Mangold and his partner Johannes Thißen MSc took over the established cable car planning office Melzer & Hopfner in 2020.
Melzer & Hopfner Ingenieursgesellschaft mbH & Co.KG was founded in 1988 and is one of the leading specialist offices in the Alpine region when it comes to ski area planning and cable car planning. Internationally known destinations such as the Arlberg, the Skicircus Saalbach-Hinterglemm Leogang Fieberbrunn, Schladming, Flachau, Gastein but also the Feldberg in the Black Forest and many more are among the loyal customers.
Since its inception, the office has implemented around 300 cable car projects and created a large number of development concepts and feasibility studies.
Day 1 & 2 | Mobility Lab
Janosch Neumann
Lawyer and Partner, Heinemann & Partner Rechtsanwälte
Janosch Neumann is a lawyer and partner in the law firm Heinemann & Partner in Essen. He is also a lecturer for construction planning and building regulations law at the German Real Estate Academy at the University of Freiburg. Mr Neumann specialises in environmental and planning law as well as infrastructure law. He advises infrastructure companies and the public sector, e.g. in matters of specialised planning law for trunk roads and energy lines, including planning approval. As a pioneer in the legal world, Mr. Neumann dealt intensively with the law of planning and approval for urban cable cars at an early stage and published specialist articles on this subject, e.g., "Urban cable cars as the subject of planning approval law - innovative infrastructure or urban planning pipe dreams". Mr. Neumann was also a member of a team of experts who supported the planning office Dress & Sommer and the Institute of Transport Studies Stuttgart in the preparation of the guideline: "Urban cable cars in public transport - Guidelines for the implementation of cable cars in German cities as part of public transport" on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Transport.
Day 1 & 2 | Mobility Lab
Raphael Schmidt
Head of Mobility & Transport, FMS Future Mobility Solutions GmbH
Raphael Schmidt studied Economics & Business Management at the Free University of Bozen-Bolzano and at the Université d'Aix-Marseille. From 2009 to 2020, he worked in various service companies in the areas of marketing and new business & innovation and managed projects at national and European level. His most recent role as Product Owner for the development of mobile apps paved his way towards IT and the mobility industry. At FMS Future Mobility Solutions GmbH, he heads the mobility consulting unit "Mobility & Transport", which specialises in intermodal mobility concepts with a focus on level +1. FMS GmbH deals with the future topics of mobility such as digitalisation, highly automated driving and innovative mobility concepts.
Day 1 & 2 | Mobility Lab
David Zillhardt
Head of Development, Ingérop
David Zillhardt is a qualified engineer and has over twenty years' experience in transport and spatial planning, particularly in urban environments. He is currently Head of Development at Ingérop Deutschland GmbH and previously headed the "Urban Planning and Transport" team at Ingérop France North-East Region. He has been involved in numerous mobility studies as well as project management and planning assignments for public transport and urban development projects at all possible scales. His active involvement in the scientific and technical management of the Ingérop Group in the urban and transport sectors has also enabled him to acquire a good knowledge of the evolution of needs. In this sense, he has notably participated in several feasibility studies on the introduction of cable car systems in urban environments.