New URBACT Good Practice label awarded to 97 cities

Launched this year, the label celebrates practical solutions cities are using every day to face challenges such as demographic change, climate and environmental targets, unemployment and urban poverty. These tried-and-tested ideas for integrated, sustainable urban development will soon be available for all cities to use.

“Our congratulations to the new URBACT Good Practice Cities – and warmest thanks for the 270 applications that were submitted!” says Emmanuel Moulin, URBACT Head of Secretariat. “With many cities telling us they have to face new problems head on, often without new resources, it’s encouraging to see so many valuable solutions here that really work – and can be adapted and reused elsewhere.”

Ideas for improving cities

URBACT is now building a database of the selected good practices, due to be published online before the end of June. It will make these urban solutions available for all to learn from, particularly urban practitioners, elected officials, researchers, and city residents.

From Aarhus in Denmark to Zaragoza in Spain, the 97 winning URBACT Good Practices are spread across 25 EU countries. One third of the cities to receive the label are new to URBACT. They tackle a broad range of overlapping themes such as job creation, social inclusion, waste reduction, and involving citizens in improving their own local areas.

Innovative URBACT Festival

All cities that applied to the URBACT Good Practice are invited to the URBACT Festival on 3-5 October in Tallinn. This innovative event will showcase the labelled good practices, help cities find partners to set up URBACT Transfer Networks, and spark new ideas in sustainable urban development.

The URBACT Good Practice winners were selected by an international jury of experts in sustainable urban development, and validated by the URBACT Monitoring Committee.

Watch this space! URBACT Good Practice City database to be published on urbact.eu soon!