EcoCore: Nine Small Cities, One Shared Journey — How a Network Became a Community
When the EcoCore partners first gathered at the Malmö Arena in autumn 2023 for the URBACT University, they came as nine distinct cities, each facing its own challenges, hopes, and quiet uncertainties:
Could a small city truly lead the green transition?
The early conversations in the room were tentative but familiar. Issues included crowded roads, old industrial areas, limited space for growth, skill shortages, brownfields needing new purposes, and citizens unsure about change. Politics struggled between old habits and new ambitions.
However, even on that first day, something subtle began to shift. People leaned in. Ideas circulated across tables. Smiles turned into laughter, and strangers formed teams.
Weeks later, the cities met in Balbriggan, Ireland. They encountered sideways rain, Atlantic winds, and the first real challenge of starting their journey together. In a room filled with large maps, markers, sticky notes, and wet coats drying by radiators, each city created its first City Canvas - a rough sketch of what they aimed to achieve.
Looking back now, those canvases feel like early drafts of stories yet to be written. What no one realized then was how deeply those stories would be shaped—not just by local plans but by what the partners would observe in each other’s cities.
Over the next two and a half years, something remarkable unfolded. A network transformed into a partnership. That partnership evolved into a community. Nine small cities found that the green transition advances more swiftly when nurtured in shared soil.
