News

13.11.2008
Britain's greenest cities are Brighton and Bristol
Bristol and Brighton occupy the top spots in a league table of Britain’s most sustainable cities. Brighton, last year’s winner, is rated highest for quality of life and future-proofing but came in second because of its comparative poor performance on...read more

12.11.2008
“Local governments must start looking at cities in a different way”
“Local governments must start looking at cities in a different way. A new vision on the city should arise from new forms of interaction between people working for local governments and other actors in the urban reality. We also need a new conceptual ...read more

10.11.2008
US mayors look forward to working with new President
During his election campaign US President-elect Barack Obama pledged to halt the decline of urban areas in cities like Detroit, Cleveland and Pittsburgh. Now mayors from America’s big cities expect him to deliver. They see Obama as the first Presiden...read more

06.11.2008
Korean cities win awards for their public toilets
The Korean cities of Seongbuk and Jinju have won an international competition to find the best public toilets, the World Health Organisation (WHO) announced in a press release on November 3rd.read more

05.11.2008
Eight cities shortlisted for "European Green Capital of the Year"
The evaluation panel has shortlisted eight out of 35 European cities to support their applications for the title as European Green Capital 2010 and 2011.read more

05.11.2008
Appeal to European Union for more child friendly cities
On November 5th, all stakeholders of the European Network of Child Friendly Cities signed a declaration for more child friendly cities during a conference in the city of Rotterdam, the Netherlands. They appeal to the European Union to stimulate and s...read more

03.11.2008
Eurostat releases its Regional Yearbook 2008
Eurostat has released its Regional Yearbook 2008. The publication includes a wide range of information on life in the regions of the EU27, candidate countries and EFTA countries. The yearbook also contains one chapter on European cities. The Urban Au...read more

03.11.2008
European Commission launches Comenius Regio
The European Commission launched Comenius Regio, a new action under the Lifelong Learning Programme, at a conference in the Committee of the Regions. With an annual budget of EUR 16 million, Comenius Regio Partnerships will support cooperation betwee...read more

31.10.2008
England loses another directly elected mayor
The UK Department of Communities and Local Government has established a 'transition board' for the Midlands city of Stoke on Trent following last week's referendum vote in favour of abolishing its elected mayor and council manager. The board will ove...read more

30.10.2008
"To tackle cases of extreme poverty housing is essential"
“About 2 million Roma people live in Romania today, of which almost one million in extreme poverty conditions in shacks, bidonvilles or ghettos”, Catalin Berescu says. “One particular feature of Romania’s poverty neighbourhoods is that communities, m...read more

29.10.2008
INTERREG IVC: launch of second call for projects
INTERREG IVC is a programme funded by the European Union that helps Europe’s regions establish partnerships, enabling them to work together on common projects. This is the third component of the Territorial Co-operation Objective of the 2007-13 progr...read more

29.10.2008
The world's most global cities
A new study compiles a list of the world's most global cities, weighing financial as well as cultural and political influence.read more

27.10.2008
Eurocities' declaration on climate change: signing ceremony held at EU French Presidency event in Lyon
On October 27th in Lyon, at the Eurocities conference on climate change, leading politicians of nearly 50 major European cities pledged their commitment to fight climate change in a common declaration. The official signing ceremony of the ‘Eurocities...read more

24.10.2008
The McCain-Obama mismatch on urban policy
How do John McCain and Barack Obama compare on urban policy and what will it mean for New York and other large cities? Obama's campaign has a detailed set of principles and proposals that differ markedly from previous Democratic policy. McCain, on th...read more

24.10.2008
UN-HABITAT unveils State of the World’s Cities report 2008/2009
Half of humanity now lives in cities, and within two decades, nearly 60 per cent of the world’s people will be urban dwellers. Urban growth is most rapid in the developing world, where cities gain an average of 5 million residents every month. As cit...read more

24.10.2008
Urban areas at risk from overheating
At the Tokyo Conference for Climate Change, representatives from the so-called C40 cities warned that crowded urban areas were particularly susceptible to the Planet’s rising temperatures.read more

23.10.2008
CEMR to launch multilingual website on town twinning
The Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) will launch its new multilingual website totally devoted to town twinning, on 13 November 2008 in Brussels.read more

23.10.2008
European Planning Awards 2008 presented in Dublin
Planning will have a crucial role in how our cities become more competitive in order to meet the new economic challenges, Ms Virna Bussadori, one of Europe’s leading planners, said at the European Urban and Regional Planning Awards in Dublin Castle, ...read more

21.10.2008
Metro works sink Budapest Technical University
The Budapest Technical University has sunk over five centimetres into the ground and cracks which first appeared in tiles are now affecting supporting walls and columns, the leader of the opposition on Budapest County Council alleged last week, blami...read more

21.10.2008
Mixing rich and poor: Dutch housing policy
In the wake of the current credit crunch, British tabloid newspaper the Daily Mirror looks at different housing policies troughout Europe. This news article focuses in (social) housing in the Netherlands. It feels the United Kingdom can learn from th...read more