Klima-Taler
City-branded climate app powered by motiontag that auto-detects walking/cycling/public-transport trips and converts CO2 saved into 'Klima-Taler' coins redeemable at local pools, museums, shops. Each participating city gets its own white-label instance; users join open teams.
Monthly CO2 team challenges run on FOUR parallel leaderboards: Cities & Regions, Schools, Companies, and Open Teams. Top-10 teams shown publicly with each user's team rank; cities/regions compete head-to-head on aggregated CO2 saved by their residents.
Within a city, residents earn coins for their team, and the coin is redeemable only at LOCAL partner shops/swimming pools/museums. So every saved km flows back into the local economy. Users form sub-teams (workplace, club, school class) inside the city instance to motivate each other.
Rare working example of a multi-tier geographic competition (city vs city AND school vs school AND open team vs open team in parallel) with a real local-redemption loop that funds intra-city collaboration. Concrete adoption (50+ German cities). Not vapor.
Others in the same family
STADTRADELN (CITY CYCLING)
Run by Climate Alliance, a 21-day campaign where municipalities sign up to compete on per-capita and absolute cycling kilometers. Mandatory team affiliation; tracked via the CITY CYCLING app GPS or paper log.
BetterPoints
Council-funded mobile app that auto-detects walking, cycling, bus, train, car-share trips and converts to BetterPoints redeemable at local retailers. Councils customize challenges per borough.
2zero Klimathon (Mannheim, Glienicke, Hufeisen-Region, Schleswig-Holstein)
6-week 'Klimathon' run by Berlin-based 2zero (formerly Klimakompass). Each week features 4-6 challenges across themes (mobility, food, energy, consumption, digital, leisure). Mannheim ran as a CoLAB pilot under the EU '100 climate-neutral cities by 2030' Mission starting Jan 2025.
Cool Block / Cool City Challenge
Block leaders recruit 5-8 neighboring households into a 'Cool Block' that runs a 9-meeting, 5-month program across carbon, water, resilience, livability, and empowerment themes. 'Cool Neighborhood' = ~10 Cool Blocks in geographic proximity.
Sustrans Big Walk and Wheel (formerly Big Pedal)
UK's largest inter-school active-travel challenge run by Walk Wheel Cycle Trust (Sustrans). For two weeks, schools log every walked, wheeled, scooted or cycled journey via a school portal; a school's best five days determine final position on a national leaderboard, with badges and certificates.
Beat the Street
A whole-town real-life game turning lamp-posts into 'Beat Boxes' (RFID sensors). Players tap cards at boxes while walking/cycling to score points. Run as time-limited campaigns (4-6 weeks) covering an entire town or city zone. Over 2 million participants across 200 communities.