But where will the new jobs in cities come from? How well prepared are our citizens to get and keep these jobs? What are the opportunities and threats? Most important of all, what can cities actually practically do to support jobs growth and to support their citizens’ chances of getting a job, keeping a job and getting a better one?

This workstream of the URBACT Capitalisation process aims to learn the lessons, both from the 300 URBACT cities and their networks, and from across the world. It will develop practical ideas, advice and recommendations to support Europe’s cities in their quest for ‘More Jobs – Better Cities’. What can cities do to get more successful results from their actions? In an age of austerity, how can they best help to grow their economies and achieve job-rich growth?

It also aims to inform the urban dimension of the 2014-20 European Union Cohesion Policy (Investing in Growth and Jobs) within the framework of the Europe 2020 Growth agenda, and to help cities prepare for the new regulations and financial instruments. Our draft findings will be based upon URBACT materials; the experience of a core group of experts and practitioners; the literature; and a series of evidence hearings. They will be presented and then discussed with you at the URBACT Annual conference in Copenhagen on 3 and 4 December and published early in 2013.

CALL FOR EVIDENCE FROM YOU

BUT we need your help NOW! We want to hear from you: your thoughts, your experiences (both good and bad), of trying to help create more jobs in YOUR city! This is an important part of the evidence on which we need to draw if we are to learn from each other what we should, and should not, do! So, please send us your views: A single page or short email will do, or you can send us existing documents / material or just links to material on the web. Whatever works for you. The important thing is that we hear from you and you share your experience with us so as to inform our work. We are particularly interested in hearing about innovative approaches and experiments. Please reply to alison@aurora-ltd.eu by FRIDAY 29 JUNE. Many thanks. Follow us on Twitter. Look for the hashtag: #morejobsforbettercities and soon we will have our own account: @Jobsforcities

Alison Partridge,
Coordinator: More Jobs: Better Cities
alison@aurora-ltd.eu

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The internet information platform Eltis published a case study with the title: Encouraging Active Travel to Hospitals, London, UK.

Indeed, the National Health Service (NHS) authority in the Tower Hamlets Borough of London has implemented a travel plan as part of the Mayor’s Transport Strategy, to encourage the use of more active travel to hospitals in the region. Attached to this case study is a Best practice guide on Transport Planning for a healthier lifestyle from Transport for London.

URBACT Active Travel Network has also as one of it’s objectives to combine active travel (walking and cycling) with an increasing of public health. The Danish partner city of Skanderborg is in particular very active to strengthen this approach in their Local action Plan.

Robert Pressl
Active Travel Lead Expert
pressl@fgm.at

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The project is exploring new ways of promoting citizen engagement in councils across Europe. Having developed a method of finding out people’s opinions through a series of focus groups and discussions, each city is now undertaking a number of pilot actions which test out both new ways of engaging citizens and which require new ways of working by councils. From the night patrol scheme being undertaken in Botkyrka in Sweden to the new types of ways of involving people in their own health care in Kavala in Greece, the partnership heard and discussed the progress being made, while at the same time we saw first hand some of the citizen engagement initiatives with children and young people taking place in Braine l’Alleud.

A lively discussed sprang up on how to engage young people. Dennis emphasised the need to link this to issues relevant to the lives of young people and the need for  public authorities to give up some power to young people. Sebastien said that we need to undertake pilot actions that follow from the issues raised in the focus groups. Clara and Dennis pursued the discussion further while the Lead expert commented that this is a huge issue across Europe and that helping youth to develop themselves is a key element of any solution.

That gives a very brief flavour of the discussion. Over the next 6 months the partners shall be developing their Co-responsibility Local Action Plans which will indicate how they intend to spread the culture of co-responsibility across their municipalities. They should make for interesting reading.

Jon Bloomfield,

TOGETHER Lead Expert

j.bloomfield@bham.ac.uk

Read more:

• TOGETHER – URBACT website
• Coresponsibility: a new relationship between local governments and citizens – URBACT website

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Many people criticize such large meetings saying that these are dominated by pompous but empty statements. With enough patience and open ears, however, interesting statements can be “angled out” from the ocean of words. The following aims to be a collection of statements which I found interesting.

In the opening speech of Mercedes Bresso, President of the Comity of the Regions (COR), strong words were used against the Urban Platform (which is one of the novelties planned by the Commissioner for the post 2013 Cohesion Policy regulation). The COR was unhappy about the idea that the Urban Platform would be organized for 300 nominated cities, emphasizing that this plan is not on terms with modern participation practices (open to all cities). According to Bresso’s view the European Parliament also shares these worries. These statements resembled a power game between two institutions (the COR and the Commission) regarding domination over the links to the European cities.

The political importance of the Summit could be seen from the presence and speech of José Manuel Barroso, the President of the European Commission. In an unusually emotional speech Barroso urged for smart and green, sustainable and inclusive growth instead of artificial growth, fuelled by irresponsible financial behaviour. As metropolitan population (living in urban areas over 250 thousand people) makes up 59% of European population, urban areas have to play vital role in the fulfilment of the new types of growth targets. The knowledge based, resource efficient, carbon free economic development of the cities is of key importance, and must be in accordance with the positive valuse of the European model of urban development. Barroso argued strongly for the inclusion of the regional and local level into the discussions over the multi-annual financial framework, even if the national governments are reluctant towards this proposal. The audience could be very satisfied with the arguments used by the president of the Commission with the hope that these were not only compliments towards the regional and local leaders but real priorities to which the Commission will insist in the upcoming difficult negotiations about the future of Cohesion Policy.

While in the debate many COR members (from the regional level and rural areas) questioned or even  opposed the accentuated role planned to be given to the urban areas, Jan Olbrycht, leader of the Urban Intergroup of the European Parliament emphasized the importance of the 5% as a special ringfencing for urban areas and made it clear that this should only be the minimum, i.e. the investments into cities should be much higher.

The second panel (and in my taste the thematically most interesting part of the meeting) was the debate about the involvement of the citizens in regional and local projects. The mayor of Bratislava described the euphoria of people 23 years ago, after the collapse of socialism. This euphoria has turned into apathy in the last years, due to many corruption cases people have lost their trust in elected politicians. Nowadays a new euphoria seems to develop among young people who argue for a new type of policy – they claim that participatory democracy has to be involved into decision making. The mayor of Ghent mentioned many types of social innovations, such as the employment of full time neighbourhood organizers, frequent neighbourhood debates, collection of locally suggested projects, etc. which are frequently and successfully used in his city. According to the mayor of Athens people argue much easier against something than to give positive opinion. It took a lot of work for the council to convince with arguments people about the need of underground parking in dense urban areas! The local leadership has to take enough time and efforts to inform, debate and convince people about new ideas to win their support. This is even more difficult in complex issues, such as area regeneration, where many strategic details have to be decided and it is much more difficult to take different interests and opinions into account. In his summary Simon Güntner expressed his reservations about direct democracy. In his view participative methods do not pay attention to many important aspects, to minority interests, to financial questions … these can only be discussed in the usual structure of political parties, as these represent certain interests (workers, middle class, etc.) . In his view the reactivation and modernization of party politics is needed.

Closing the conference Mercedes Bresso, President of the CoR, said that cities must be in the front line also in the efforts to change mindset about lifestyles and consumption; they present the lowest but finest level of solidarity.

Read more:

• Ivan Tosics Full Report – PDF

Iván Tosics
URBACT Thematic Pole Manager

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Roma unemployment is a complex phenomenon, it is difficult to remedy given the multi-layered and inter-generational elements, but Cities cannot afford to ignore the problem.

In 2004 the development economist Hector McNeill reported that ‘Roma-specific unemployment, or underemployment, has created endemic economic under-performance of the economies of Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia’. Since then things have not improved and whole communities of Roma people are negatively affected by mass unemployment, poverty and poor living conditions. All of which are intensified by the ongoing economic crisis, the rise in general unemployment, increased discrimination and negative press attention on Roma.

The added pressures on social service, welfare benefits and training for employment budgets all significantly increase the risk for Roma of remaining unemployed and living in poverty.

Often Roma people are held responsible for their own situation, the Draft Joint Employment Report 2004/2005, recognises this – “The burden is often placed on individuals to adapt rather than addressing wider issues of discrimination in society at large. The Roma or migrants often seem to be portrayed largely as responsible for their labour market exclusion”.  This situation results in even worse treatment of Roma people and the lack of encouraging policies on the national level.

Roma people living in the URBACT ROMA-NeT project partner cities are seriously affected by unemployment, often long term unemployment and systemic exclusion from the labour market and from jobs. Practitioners from the Partner cities who have experience and learning to share in this field were invited to participate in the third ROMA-NeT transnational learning cluster and to work with experts on the following overall theme of Building a transitional labour market – creating, supporting and using an intermediate labour market; the role of the social economy/ social firms ; justification using social accounting and audit. Find the results of this event here.

Read more:

• ROMA-NeT – URBACT website
• ROMA-NeT learning event focuses on Roma and the Labour market – URBACT Website
• ROMA-NeT Newsletter – PDF

Ann Morton Hyde
ROMA-NeT Lead Expert

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Today the International Women’s Day will be celebrated – statistics and numbers will once again be used to show that European women still keep on encountering more obstacles than men in the job market and as entrepreneurs.

The European Commission’s strategy  for equality between women and men (2010-2015) recommends “using the potential and the reservoir of women’s talents more intensively and more effectively in order to increase economic and commercial benefits”.

The Europe 2020 Strategy sets a goal of 75% employment rate among men and women between the age of 20 and 64!

In the context of today’s economic crisis, cities can play a key role in helping achieve these goals and be a key factor of progress.

In the framework of the URBACT project WEED, nine European cities – from Sweden, Czech Republic, Spain, Slovenia, Italy, France and the UK – worked on identifying and developing integrated local actions to improve chances for women in employment, entrepreneurship and the knowledge economy.

Here are their recommendations:

1.    Municipalities have a role to play in supporting women and their entrepreneurial projects:

• By setting up measures in schools for early intervention in fighting deep-seated attitudes concerning career choices for girls and boys and the roles of women and men;
• By making micro-financing accessible to women;
• By developing more integrated and more innovative support for business creation and growth.

2.    At a local level, it is possible to act on the quality of women’s employment:

• If employers create working conditions that are more favourable to family life;
• If flexible training activities open up new careers that are less gender-determined;
• If social enterprises are encouraged to create new areas of growth.

3.    Gender inequality in the knowledge economy can be overcome:

• Through interesting and better-targeted training, including local work based on knowledge centres;
• By making the environment more favourable to women and the family;
• By effective regional partnerships between municipalities and universities.

Read more:

• WEED Final Report – URBACT website
• Zoom on Celje, Slovenia – URBACT Website
• URBACT project results – URBACT Website

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Clusters have been a main theme of interest in regional and urban planning theory since the 80’s, with the attention paid to the region Emilia- Romagna for instance.

The idea has been revived in the context of urban deprived areas in big cities since the publication of Richard’s Florida book in  2002: The rise of the creative class and many cities have taken the idea on board.

Recently, 10 European Cities have  worked together in the frame of the URBACT project ‘Creative Clusters’ to develop a vision for the development of a creative economy in cities with low urban density with an integrated urban development approach!

In a few words these ten cities have worked to translate the idea that creative industries are not a matter of fashion, but of real local economic development.

Here you can find their 6 recommendations for a creative economy in cities with low urban densities:

1. Providing a framework for creative industries by developing skills clusters.

The urban renewal potential and job creation offered by creativity industries should not be envisioned in an isolated manner, but rather through a new approach to the local economy that includes the creation of skills clusters. In Finland, the city of Jyväskylä decided to capitalise on creativity industries in order to improve quality of life and wellbeing. The Municipality also broadened the scope of possible application to other areas in the local economy (forestry industry, bioenergy, nanotechnologies, education, etc.).

Creativity and design should also be used to give a new boost to the growth of mature local industries. The city of Hódmezővásárhely, in Hungary, did this in the ceramics sector. 
The challenge is two-fold and entails promoting the creation of new skills clusters and working to boost already existing economic sectors by activating all the growth potential offered by creativity.

2. Attracting and retaining creative professionals

Local governments have a role to play in implementing specific measure to support entrepreneurs in the creative sector (financially, logistically and by providing consulting). Among the arsenal of measures available are reduced taxation, leasing and real estate support measures, financial tools such as capital risk, and the creation of a “business angel” network.

The concept of “alliances”, a recent innovation in European industrial policy, proves to be very useful for activities that are as integrated and emerging as the creativity industry. 

Concretely, it is a question of operating in a more open and horizontal way in order to build a closer relationship between innovation, its financing and cooperation.

3. New urban environments for creativity to bloom

In order to develop an effective strategy based on creativity, it is necessary to set up a space that is conducive to creation, and this needs to happen on several levels (from urban planning to architectural design).

In the area of urban planning, creativity can be a driving force for the renewal of city centres. This was, notably, the objective of the city of Terni, in Italy, which was connected to the URBACT Creative Clusters project, although it was not a partner. Among the other strategies that were implemented, we should note the creation of central squares (the city of Jyväskylä) and actions to promote a better connection between the city and the surrounding countryside (the city of Óbidos). Two factors are particularly important: continuity between the spaces devoted to professional creation and those devoted to private life, and a fair balance between trade, leisure, work and housing.

As for architectural design, a new trend is to emerging with installations that promote creativity. For example, there are business incubators, thematic business parks (the city of Viareggio), creation programmes in traditional business centres, artist residences, cultural installations (Casa da Musica in Porto), and alternative “low-cost” cultural spaces. Hybrid approaches, flexibility, interaction and experimentation are key to developing “creative” environments with the goal of reintroducing production sites into cities.

One of the key challenges is to avoid elitism. In isolated avant-garde neighbourhoods, it is preferable to promote “local creative ecosystems” whose functions are fully integrated into the city.

4. Creating bridges between culture and economic development

The cultural agenda is not only a tool for creativity; it can also play a role of catalyser or at least promote a local creative ecosystem. In this perspective, the local authorities have to ask the following questions: What cultural policy should we implement in order to promote cultural entrepreneurship? Are public commercial cultural sites well managed? Are they adapted to the demand and to the development of a creative economy?

In many cases, it is necessary to rethink the traditional approach that presides in terms of cultural events, and to innovate when it comes to objectives, formats and strategies.

5. Innovative education policies to drive the local creative ecosystem

At the city level, one notes a strong correlation between innovation in educational systems and the solidity of strategies that promote creativity. Cities such as Jyväskylä and Kortrijk led future talent incubation projects starting in school.

6. Administrating the local creative ecosystem

An effective strategy for a creative economy requires leadership and a shared vision. This leadership should evolve, with more active involvement and participation from stakeholders, and it should make it possible to deliver local policies and micro-projects designed on the basis of solid partnerships. The city of Kortrijk, in Belgium, is one example of this.

Finally, communication is an essential tool for disseminating strategies both inside and outside of cities. From this perspective, the creation of a brand should be perceived as a tool for promoting creativity rather than as an end in itself.

Read more:

• Creative Clusters Final Report: PDF
• Zoom on Jyväskylä, Finland: URBACT website
• URBACT project results : URBACT website

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The URBACT projects EVUE and Active Travel Network already spread their findings via Eltis.

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Eltis intensely co-operates with other big initiatives like CIVITAS, EPOMM, Managenergy or Covenant of Mayors

Link to Eltis promo clip: http://www.eltis.org/index.php?ID1=23&id=92

Robert Pressl
Active Travel Network Lead Expert

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Most research indicates the ‘chicken or egg’ scenario when it comes to the vehicles as prospective buyers are hesitant due to the lack of charging infrastructure and infrastructure providers are hesitant due to the low number of vehicles. From the URBACT EVUE project experience however, it has become clear that once an initial availability of charging points has been provided, the focus needs to go on education and awareness training.

This can be achieved through Electric Vehicules days where people can test the cars and experience the cars for themselves. In addition, a focus on getting electric vehicules  into commercial fleets will contribute significantly as they give access to large numbers of employees to travel. So perhaps it’s less of which comes first, but both come together.

Read more:

• EVUE’s Newsletter n° 6 – PDF
• EVUE – URBACT website

Matthew Noon
EVUE Lead Partner

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Job Roos is a rare example of Dutch architect dedicated to the retrofitting of existing buildings. His expertise has become highly requested now that it has become clear the urgency of adapting our cities for sustainable development and that the most sustainable way to do it is to upgrade existing buildings. The paradigm shift from demolition&new building to retrofitting of existing buildings in the Netherlands has been symbolically marked by a traumatic event: the fire that destroyed the Architecture Faculty of the TU Delft on 13th May 2008. That shocking experience and the quick and smart re-birth of the Bouwkunde Faculty from its ashes was the subject of Job Roos’s presentation in a workshop of the URBACT LINKS Network in Veria (Greece). After the workshop I had the chance to ask Job a couple of questions about the relationship between contemporary architecture and heritage conservation in his country.

The Netherlands is a man-made land where almost nothing is natural. Dutch people are well knows for their capacity to face problems and find innovative and pragmatic solutions. Sometimes they do it without caring too much about legacy of the past or the so-called genius loci. Is this attitude changing in recent years?

‘One can sense the changing attitude. What certainly does help is the world-crisis since 2008. More and more we are forced to use the existing building-stock, about 70 % of the design-task for next generations is in the re-use of the existing. For instance there is a lot of office space empty in the Netherlands (about 7 million square meters), and another example in 2020 about 1200 churches will be without use. Not such an easy task to transform these buildings into more economical use, but there is a strong wish to do so. Government supports this approach, but the market is still not on the real move. As far as the legacy of the past is concerned, it is positive that we have to deal more and more with the existing. Economically driven yes, innovation and pragmatic will come up as is the Dutch attitude for ages already in this by man controlled delta. But there also is the chance for professional designers and developers to train ourselves and the public in the unique possibilities our frozen culture offers us. And we do need to work hard on this.’

Is the restoration of built heritage a sustainable cost for municipalities with scarce resources and a real estate sector in difficulty?

I would rather answer the question out of the perspective of the developer. My experience that the projects which are still on the move are those with a thorough link with history. In fact one could add to the previous question, that the public is still willing to invest more for their houses in something with a profound link to history. I can see this happen in my own projects that are still on the move such as the re-use of an old rope-factory (added with the presence of nice landscape), the re-use of military complexes and also on locations of industrial heritage. The real problems for redevelopment one can see in the vast stock of office-space where culture is not the strongest feature. Here we need a total new approach for redevelopment which really goes beyond the individual objects. It concerns sustainable investment in city patterns with the focus on added value. Success is dependent on multidisciplinarity and unorthodox approach.

What are the cornerstones of a coherent, creative, sustainable and future proof management of historical city centers?

I would say a wide perspective on future possibilities. Therefore a good sensibility of what was, what is and what could be. As a matter of fact a lot of knowledge and skills concerning the past to manage the past into the future. To be successful in process one needs a good balance and communication between (local) government and their civil servants and advisers. This means being very professional and having the right expertise and attitude and a real and good managed involvement of the public. The understanding of value and how to handle it (cultural, social, emotional, economical value etc.) in a good balance may be the main cornerstone for the development into the future of our past. Therefore we need social and contextual intelligence amongst our the important stakeholders.

Prof. Roos suggested to conclude and illustrate this short interview with some pictures of a much debated project in Rotterdam: the renovation of the Post building proposed by UN-Studio. The project is about the radical transformation of the old Post Office in the center of Rotterdam into a shopping center, while keeping its main architectural features. His opinion about it is that  “if one can look (and is willing to search) behind the design task and its possible meaning for the city, it could work.”

by Antonio Borghi, expert for the LINKS network, first published in his blog Well Designed and Built

view of main hall - plans for 2014

view of main hall - plans for 2014

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