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    Turin: A European success story with URBACT and Urban Innovative Actions

    Three of the cities selected in the first call of Urban Innovative Actions (UIA) are working or have worked within URBACT on topics similar to their UIA bids: Turin, Bologna and Rotterdam. 

    We decided to try to understand what made these cities successful at being involved in those two European programmes and whether there is – for these cities - something like a trajectory from URBACT, in which integrated action plans are designed, to UIA, which provides the framework and the support to implement those innovative ideas locally.
     
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    This article is the first of a planned series of three articles on the topic.
    It is based on an interview with Fabrizio Barbiero, public manager at the unit of development of economic development and innovation and European Project, at the Municipality of Turin.
     
     

    s.pruvot@urbact.eu

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  • Scaling the commons: the experience of the European Commons Assembly

    Nu är det dags att nominera din stad till Access City Award 2019.

    Laura Colini

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  • Specific approaches needed to implement policies for the creative sector

    CREATIVE SPIRITS is a network of nine European cities, funded by the European Union in the frame of the URBACT III Programme. The nine CREATIVE SPIRITS partner cities have a common need to improve the implementation of their existing integrated urban strategies/action plans by including novel approaches linked to creative and cultural industries (CCI) – creative places, people and businesses. The joint policy challenge for the network is to better facilitate the “creative ecosystem” to be able to attract (more) creative entrepreneurs and boost creative entrepreneurship in dedicated urban areas.

    Hen Gerritse

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  • Here Come the JobTowns

    JobTown 2 is about youth employment in Europe.

    Ian Goldring

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  • Health in Public Spaces: The challenge of inactive citizens for cities

    One of the main challenges for cities in the coming decade is how to make their citizens become physically active again.

    Physical inactivity and sedentary lifestyles have become a leading risk factor for health. Cities are affected by the dramatic increase in the frequency of chronic diseases related to physical inactivity amongst their citizens. These chronicle diseases like coronary heart and respiratory diseases, colon cancer and obesity are resulting in high and early morbidity, loneliness and social exclusion. Collectively physical inactivity has substantial consequences for direct health-care costs but also causes high indirect costs due to increased periods of sick leave, work disabilities and daily care. With decentralising tendencies of tasks like (un)employment, social care and basic health care from national levels to local levels, cities have become a key player in keeping their citizens active.
     
    This article offers an overview of this challenge  advocating this theme as an integrated part of sustainable urban planning in Europe. 

    Twan De Bruijn

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  • Densification beyond the city centre: urban transformation against sprawl

    Densification of urban areas beyond the core of the cities is not an easy task but it is a challenge worth taking to fight against urban sprawl.. City centres, which are usually already dense and mostly regenerated, are surronded by transitional belts (sometimes called fringe areas) which have diverse urban functions with lower density, offering in principle good opportunities for densifying interventions towards the aim of compact city development. However, the task is not easy at all: physical interventions to achieve environmental benefits have high risks of negative social externalities; moreover they require substantial financial means in a period when the public sector suffers from the consequences of the financial crisis. 

    The challenges of densification are first discussed from a theoretical point of view and illustrated by city examples. Then the approach of the URBACT Action Plannig Network sub>urban is highlighted, showing innovative approaches in four of the project partner cities. Finally a snapshot is given about the dynamic way in which sub>urban is dealing with this challenging topic in transnational meetings. 

    Ivan Tosics

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