Client: TELT (Tunnel Euralpin Lyon Turin), with concept partner Demos Helsinki
Location: Susa Valley (Italy) and Maurienne Valley (France)
Year: 2022–2023
Sector: Interactive Web · Storytelling · Tourism · Rail Infrastructure
Turning static cartography into a scrollable public story — SMARTLAND lets anyone explore the Lyon-Turin rail corridor from a pan-European map down to the specific attractions, food, and trails of each valley it passes through.
Maps explain a rail corridor’s place in Europe’s network. They don’t make people want to visit the valleys along the way. TELT wanted both — a public tool that could do the technical case for the tunnel and the tourism case for the region it runs through, in one scrolling experience.
Built directly on SPIN Unit’s 2020 cartography for TELT, with the same three-party structure: Demos Helsinki and TELT’s own communications team on concept, SPIN Unit on interactive development. Commissioned via a formal bid in October 2022.
Reused the 2020 pan-European TEN-T, EuroVelo, and rail network map as the storymap’s opening chapter, then built a scroll-driven interactive experience (Mapbox GL JS) zooming progressively from the pan-European scale down to the France-Italy region, the historic and new Mont Cenis tunnels, and finally lower, middle, and upper sections of the Susa and Maurienne valleys — each populated with local attractions, food, museums, and sports content.
Delivered as a live public web tool, subsequently used as a demo piece at TELT trade-fair exhibitions, presented on tablets alongside dedicated branded posters.
- Directly reused the 2020 cartography rather than starting from scratch — a genuine example of one engagement’s output compounding into a second, more ambitious deliverable years later.
- Structured around four content categories across three elevation bands in two countries — a substantial, structured tourism dataset well beyond what the original mapping project scoped.
- Used as a real-world outreach tool, not just a website — demoed live on tablets at TELT exhibition booths, with dedicated printed signage referencing the project by name.
- The three-party credit structure (concept vs. development) is stated directly in the product itself — a useful model for how SPIN Unit’s technical role sits within a larger communications engagement.
Gave TELT a public-facing tool that does double duty — explaining the tunnel’s place in Europe’s transport network while promoting tourism in the valleys it runs through — and extended the useful life of the original 2020 cartography well beyond a single report.