ABSTRACT. A historical urban landscape is not just an aggregation of old buildings, for residents it is material manifestation of memories and meanings which connect individuals to place and society. In research on place-attachment, it has been shown that active connections with the environment have value for the well-being and social functioning of individuals. Furthermore, it has been demonstrated that people's place-attachment cannot be fully explained on the grounds of representational value. Affect and emotions, with the processing of experiences and memories, play a key role in the formation of people's connection to places. In recent years, there has been an upsurge in considering emotions and affective factors in analysing people's relationship to cultural heritage. In an ongoing study, qualitative methods are developed on this basis to gain a holistic understanding and insight into people's relationship with places and everyday heritage. This paper examines how two methodologies, walking-interviews and sensory research methodology involving the use of audio-visual recording glasses, differ and complement each other to shed a light on people's place-attachment and how residents form a multifaceted relationship with the urban landscape. The potentials and limitations of the sensory research methodologies are considered, exploring how they can be used to provide access to emotional and affective aspects of the people-place nexus. By giving insights into the more-than-representational, the paper argues that the methods can be used in substantiating claims for the social values of everyday heritage and should thus be taken into consideration when it comes to heritage management.

ABSTRACT. Resilience has become an increasingly important concept in the cultural heritage field, particularly in the aftermath of the unprecedented challenges the COVID-19 global pandemic brought. However, on a conceptual and practical level, resilience remains closely linked to the technical conservation of built heritage, and there remains a need to develop broader approaches inclusive of cultural and socioeconomic components. This article investigates the potential applicability of theoretical concepts linked to identity and identities in heritage planning to help fill these gaps and develop approaches that consider resilience and are better able to address a range of unanticipated disasters. We first review the literature and policy documents to define and identify the potential for identities-based approaches. We then examine the case of Matera, an extremely fragile world heritage site in southern Italy that has been continuously inhabited for more than 8000 years and provides a relevant example of resilience. We explore the trends and effects of globalised tourism development before the pandemic and the post pandemic emergence of more local/regional and slow tourism patterns, largely based on cultural solutions to local development challenges and knowledge exchange. Through this comparison, we analyse the potential and limitations of introducing identities-based concepts into heritage planning as a more robust way to enhance resilience and prepare cities for unexpected future crises.

ABSTRACT. In recent years inner city core of Nis is enduring an impromptu transformation by densification, with new medium rise buildings being scattered around sporadically – wherever the owners are willing to sell the plots with low rise family houses. This introduced a set of problems for both the old inhabitants, the newcomers and citizens of Nis in general. Problems range from ecological to social, for example: deficit of parking spaces; traffic congestion – without viable public transportation; cut off vistas and losing the sense of place, to name a few. Also, new buildings are shaped the way plot sizes and shapes allow it, therefore, spatial organisation of the apartments is constrained – which affects the quality of living spaces. Throughout history, Nis has been part of different states and has undergone various localised changes as well as planned transformations. Still, it entered 21st century as a relatively compact and walkable city, with traces of leftover historic buildings and a defined city core comprised of distinct mix of low rise buildings – characteristic of the years during and after Ottoman reign; intertwined with later multi-storey ones – mainly from Yugoslavian and socialist era. With transitional period and start off of market capitalism Nis, similarly to other Serbian cities, got its share of annexed stories built on top of multi-storey buildings from previous decades; and “investor urbanism” of the 21st c. brought random multi-storey buildings into the city core. Thus, the trend of densifying city core is not new but the poor ecological and social effects of it are not seen before in this scope, to the point of determinating the trend as unsustainable. Research is based on comparison of relevant urban parameters and an analyses of how this new environment is perceived by the inner city core residents and other citizens.

ABSTRACT. This paper explores the value of urban activation in the city. The research formulates a key part of an ongoing PhD investigating artist-led spatial production in the city, with a focus on East Street Arts (ESA) as urban activator. Starting late 1990s, in Europe, we noticed an adoption of area-based initiatives aimed at addressing issues with local scale socio-economic problems in underprivileged neighbourhoods. Placemaking was seen as a method of generating high-quality environments, contributing to the argument that urban regeneration in a disadvantaged area may help fight urban poverty, the resulting environmental deterioration, and foster economic growth. The liveability agenda, which has been adopted all over the world and which promotes the provision of clean, safe, and green public places and streets, is a component of this emphasis on the quality of the environment. Artist-led space plays a variety of roles in community and economic growth, operating as a tool for constructing social networks that contribute to both community regeneration and artistic development. This paper will explore the potential and limitations of artist-led spaces to engage in community and economic development. Art spaces’ primary contribution to neighbourhood development is that they serve as a tool for cultivating social links and social capital that contribute to both community regeneration and artistic development. Still, issues around location, organisational form, and management of space may limit their community and economic development potential, especially in relation to making connections to other cultural clusters in the region. In this paper, I will introduce a selection of artist-led spaces and their tactics and modes of working within the city as an attempt to provide a basis of analysis of East Street Arts, ultimately demonstrating that ESA is an urban activator.

ABSTRACT. The importance of the school’s physical environment in shaping children’s experience in urban space is a recurrent research subject, with scholars advocating for incidental learning as part of an environmental education for young citizens. Public space adjacent to schools is fundamental for encouraging children’s conscious growth in relation to urban life, independent mobility (IM), engagement with the environment and sense of belonging. This paper aims to present a qualitative photovoice process as part of a research on Active School Travel (AST) in the region of Lombardy in Italy, where a workshop involving 122 middle and high school students was carried out in autumn 2022. Each student was asked to produce three photographs (accompanied by a short description): the first being representative of the school’s square; the second on the main element they like; and the third on the main element they dislike. By assessing the collected material, this paper examines children’s affective perception of public space around schools in terms of likability, as well as environmental features that might influence such affective judgements. The emphasis of this research is for children rather than on children. Scholars advocate for a holistic approach when addressing the experience of children: their perception of micro-level urban design features quantity and quality of stimulation of the environment, and thus should not be limited in planning safe spaces around schools. Through this research, we aim to contribute to the current debate with a methodological tool that is participatory and inclusive, and could potentially serve as an instrument for educators and municipal policy makers. 

ABSTRACT. This paper presents original findings from a three-year multi-disciplinary investigation, funded by the UK Arts and Humanities Research Council, revealing new evidence of a distinct and important, yet largely unrecognised, body of divisive architecture and spatiality: a realm of ‘hidden barriers’ stemming from a confidential process of security planning taking place between 1978 and 1985, at the height of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Quite distinct from Belfast’s highly visible ‘peace wall’ structures, these hidden barriers are made up of everyday, ordinary and seemingly benign parts of the built environment, such as shops, roads, factories and landscaping. Through qualitative analysis of previously classified government documents, alongside practice-led architectural fieldwork across six research case-studies, the paper uses detailed architectural mapping and immersive fieldwork photography to illustrate the complex ways in which these hidden barriers continue to promote social, economic and physical division across Catholic and Protestant communities in present-day Belfast. Through an examination of their contemporary social, economic and physical effects, the paper raises critical questions about the role of architecture and spatial planning in conflict-transformation, residential desegregation and wider peacebuilding processes.

ABSTRACT. Although urban stakeholders have been widely discussed in urban management, stakeholder has yet to be rigorously discussed through a solid definition and rigid theoretical rigor based on stakeholder theory. Thus, this study considered the solid and widely known stakeholder construct defined by Freeman (1984, p. 49) as “who can affect or are affected by the achievement of an organization’s purpose.” Thus, our purpose is to categorize the main stakeholder types in urban management discussed in the mainstream literature taking the construct of stakeholder proposed by Freeman in 1984 as a unit of analysis. An urban stakeholder is any party that affects or is affected by the achievement of urban management purposes. Thus, through a qualitative meta-analysis on stakeholders in urban management, we revisited the construct of stakeholder proposed by Freeman in 1984, which was essential to objective analysis. Our main findings are: (1) government, industry, citizen, and civil society are the most outstanding stakeholder types in urban management literature; and (2) academia, tourists, union, media, investors, financial institutions, suppliers, partnerships, and supranational and international organizations are important but not outstanding stakeholder types. As a result, we provided a better understanding of how urban stakeholders have been affected or have been affected by urban management purposes, which is useful for practitioners to improve the relationships within urban governance and for value creation for all stakeholders. For this reason, policymakers and urban planners can use this knowledge of stakeholder construct to foster democracy and common-well. Further studies should consider: extending this research by applying the definition of stakeholder salience; exploring whether government, industry, citizen, and civil society could be not only critical for innovation ecosystem helices but also for sustainable stakeholder governance; exploring the role of each stakeholder type in sustainable urban strategy, power of networks, and urban marketing.

ABSTRACT. In this paper, I explore the role of stakeholder participation in a Swedish strategic planning project. Strategic urban planning has long been promoted as an important approach to transitioning to sustainable communities. However, previous literature on the Nordic context has critiqued strategic activities because they often take place outside of statutory planning procedures and therefore present legitimacy deficiencies. While the inclusion of both stakeholders and diverse expertise has been recognised as important in strategic planning, previous planning literature has focused either on the role of politics or of knowledge in planning, but not as much on the relationship between the two. This paper aims to deepen our understanding of how political and epistemic authority affect the legitimacy of strategic planning by exploring how participants in an informal strategic planning process enact authority. By applying a theoretical framework of stakeholderness and boundary work, the paper shows how the interrelation of political and epistemic authority is important for some actors when legitimizing an informal planning process. The paper concludes by suggesting the concept of knowledgeable stakeholders to describe these actors and their enactment of political and epistemic authority. This paper argues for a need to repoliticise participation in strategic planning by illuminating the interrelatedness of politics and expertise, to which the concept of knowledgeable stakeholders can contribute.

ABSTRACT. In May 2010, the incoming Conservative Government abolished Regional Spatial Strategies, and with it the longstanding principle of strategic planning at a greater than local authority level: a previously longstanding feature of planning in England. Using their new found autonomy, the four local authorities in the West of England sub-region with the City of Bristol at its heart, were in the top-ten local authorities nationally for immediate retrenchment on their housing growth plans. Using interview material and documentary evidence, this paper explores two failed attempts to re-introduce sub-regional spatial planning across the sub-region, the first through a voluntary partnership of the four local authorities, and the second led by the Mayoral Combined Authority for the West of England, using powers under the sub-region’s devolution deal with central government. Still an unfolding story, the paper explores what this reveals about prospects for the strategic management of growth in the absence of effective governance frameworks, and explores the ongoing impact of this political dissonance on the city-region.

ABSTRACT. The paper attempts to provide a brief critical commentary on the reimagining conflict heritage through tracking the prints and traces of bodily mnemonics and their intersectionality and ephemerality in Palermo, Sicily. Regarding the politicisation of heritage upon manipulations through the power of contested world politics and ideologies, Sicilian heritage is located as a medium to discuss visible and invisible terrains of the conflict in the public space through narratives, while exploring the art-based responses in democratizing, healing and reconciling conflict heritage: How conflict heritage can be transformed into a source in democratizing, healing and reconciling society? How can we engage with the trilogy of conflict, heritage and arts in the public space? Sicily, and particularly the Albergheria district of Palermo (which can be translated as “home” in Italian) in that sense is a palimpsest of multi-scalar encapsulation of conflict: a strategic crossroad in the middle of the Mediterranean and a gate to flowing borderscape reclaiming inside and outside: refugees as new migrants, religion & violence, walls, limits & human rights, and a landscape founded and empowered through flows, negotiations and dialogue as an encounter of diversity within the project's chronological trajectory as opening the path for critical discussion on consumerism, heritageisation or a dive into the bodily mnemonics. The focus of exploration is ethnographic and archival work through different urban histographies, geographies of conflict and trans-mapping narratives: A palimpsest of knowledge, meanings, customs and materiality manifested in everyday life nurturing coexistence. Apart from in-depth research through textual (and visual archives), oral histories, personal stories and scholarly work, the research is built upon interviews, on-site documentation and observation. The research is an outcome of the “Trans-making: Art, culture, economy to democratize society”, a Horizon 2020 MSCA-RISE Project of the author which has been finalized in September 2022.

ABSTRACT. Gentrification has been discussed by Ruth Glass in 1964 and has been regarded as one of the most important urban phenomena. Originally, gentrification indicated the displacement of working class residences to middle class residences and the rehabilitation of properties. With the subsequent unfolding of urban development, there are many types of gentrification found in the worldwide (Lees, 2000). In addition, gentrification has become a common phenomenon in non-western cities, and gentrification is no longer limited to the inner city, but has moved outward to the suburbs and even rural areas. Taipei is the capital city of Taiwan as well as a special municipality. Located in northern part of Taiwan, the 2022 population of Taipei is approximately 2.5 million. With an active central business district and several major public investments (e.g., Taipei MRT system), the pace of gentrification in Taipei has accelerated. This study investigates the impact of gentrification of MRT stations and the surrounding space, and examines the spatial and temporal effects of MRT-induced gentrification over ten years. The approach to exploring the socio-economic features of susceptible areas to gentrification consists of two levels. Initially, the study uses the area around MRT stations in Taipei City as the target population, and discusses the significance of the distance between MRT stations through a relatively small set of indicators. The second level of the study applies principle component analysis (PCA) to explore key components among the various stages of gentrification including household income, low-income households, educational attainment, and population migration etc. The results of the PCA may help to understand the socio-economic features of a particular area to identify appropriate strategies to solve the disproportionate impacts on vulnerable residents in the locations susceptible to gentrification.

ABSTRACT. Scholars have acknowledged how the contemporary housing affordability crisis is an “urban” one, affecting mostly attractive cities (Wetzstein, 2017; Haffner/Hulse, 2021). However, the urban affordability crisis involves very different social and territorial dimensions and intersects with multiple crises. We believe that a broader framing of the affordability problem is needed to identify solutions going beyond the usual “supply” approach (Wetzstein, 2022). The paper reflects upon the experience of a studio class in the Master’s programme ‘Urban Planning and Policy Design’ at Politecnico di Milano. The studio revolved around the question of how to organize an affordable roof over one’s head in attractive cities with high housing and living costs, aimed at providing space for an open discussion on potential solutions for individuals and families with small and uncertain salaries. The heterogeneous composition of the class, composed of students of 24 nationalities with multiple professional backgrounds (architecture, planning, design, economics, engineering, real estate, sociology, political science, history), allowed for an exploration of diverse connotations of affordability and the application of various methodologies and tools to tackle topics surrounding affordability. One outcome is a vast collection of international case studies of hyperaffordable and unaffordable housing situations, raising the question whether the existing conceptual frameworks of comparative housing studies are suitable to capture notions of affordability beyond eurocentric and urban-centric models. The studio has furthermore demonstrated to be a privileged testbed for our research, resulting in utopian, radical and provocative proposals by the students. In line with Humboldt’s model of the unity of research and teaching, we argue that such proposals can stimulate a scientific reflection on the adequacy of existing solutions and potential ways to move forward in frontline research and policies.

ABSTRACT. Nations in the 21. st century practise housing policies which aim to be sustainable in ecological, financial, and social aspects. In Finland the local housing policy guides the cities to grow in terms of the land already on use. Popular global eco-led housing policy is to renew the already existing housing structure. This often means renovating older and cheaper houses that are in bad condition. (Lees & al. 2008.) In cases of gentrification, it’s often the poor and un-normative people who are displaced from their homes (ibid; Pull & Richard 2021). The presentation concerns housing social work, later HSW (Granfelt 2015), done with habitants, that were displaced in a state-led urban city planning project in Finland, and especially the very recognition (Sennet 2003) of the 200 habitants. Presentation shows how the inequalities of urban planning can be reduced through HSW with habitants who have a vulnerable societal status. Richard Sennet’s term recognition (2003) has its roots on theories about the socially constructed nature of reality. Recognition means ability to honour people who are in inequal societal status and especially ones’ skill to lower the barriers of inequality from the way of the ’act of recognition’. Lowering barriers and moving bureaucratic obstacles away from the habitants inequal housing pathways was done in case researched. A qualitative interview data of 15 housing social worker is used to analyze the ‘work of recognition’ that was done by the workers, to help the habitants secure their future housing.

ABSTRACT. The housing crises affecting many advanced economies have been attributed to the 'great excess' of global capitalism (Aalbers, 2015) and the rise of 'bubble economies' after the 2008/09 Global Financial Crisis. Accelerated financialization on the demand side combines with supply-side blockages to drive housing cost crises in numerous countries. Resolution must lie in reregulation of the financial sector, to slow and reverse the inflation of speculative bubbles, and greater attention to housing supply. However, interventions normally happen only on the supply side. In England, since 2013 Conservative governments have insisted that the only route out of the housing crisis is to 'get the planners off our backs' embarking on a program of planning reform focused on 'permitted development rights'. . PDR is used to sidestep the scrutiny that planning applications are normally subject to and have allowed developers to turn office and commercial buildings to housing use, as a means of delivering housing ‘numbers'. Independent reviews consistently show that many PDR schemes are poorly located, low quality, and frequently reminiscent of the slums of the past.. But government holds PDR up as an example of the 'market' resolving the country's undersupply of new homes. In this presentation, we argue that the conversion of offices to residential use can be done well and make a real contribution to housing supply. But regulation rather that deregulation is the means to achieve this goal. PDR conversions in England are compared to a longer history of conversion in Italy, where a zonal planning system allows changes of use to progress 'by right', but according to national and local ordinances designed to ensure quality. The deregulatory mindset is deepening England's housing crisis: a stripped-down market logic is not the answer to delivering good quality affordable homes for those who need them

ABSTRACT. As a housing affordability crisis is striking everywhere around the worlds and – especially in attractive urban agglomerations – public and private institutions have started to become aware of growing housing problems. Nevertheless, housing issues have a highly contested and political nature. There is a risk of instrumental interpretation of data and information that can be used, for example, to capture policy-makers and/or to influence market choices. This is particularly true for Italy, where since the retrenchment of welfare state from the housing domain in the 1990s, the institutions that had the role of collecting and analysing certified data on housing problems were gradually defunded and eventually closed. The problem is particularly relevant in Milan, where housing prices have decoupled from national trends in the last decade. For these reasons, a joint venture between two housing cooperatives and the Department for Architecture and Urban Studies of Politecnico di Milano developed into the foundation of the Observatory for Housing Affordability in the Milan Metro Area (hereafter, OCA). OCA collects data on the housing market, the labor market and the housing stock and combines it in original ways in order to provide evidence of the trends of housing affordability in the metropolitan area. The paper presents some preliminary results after approximately six months of quantitative research on Milan. Focusing on the period starting from 2015 – the symbolic turning point of the international EXPO taking place in Milan, when real estate became again an attractive business in Milan – the paper shows: - how the growth of housing prices and rents has outpaced the growth of incomes; - how a major share of income earners in Milan cannot afford decent housing; - how the issue of affordable housing has finally gained in the past months relevance in the public debate.

ABSTRACT. “Cyber capital” has to do with the emergence of a new economic organization of the contemporary world, based on digital technologies and a new category of economic players, digital platforms, which are generating radical socio-economic transformations. Bringing in new economic models, digital platforms have started deeply reshaping our lives, as well as our places, producing a new powerful virtual space, that can act apparently in autonomy from places, despite still being in need of combinations with physical spaces: this kind of space is identified by literature as “cyber-space”. This new form of space is characterized by an apparently more distributive nature not necessarily in need of the traditional spatial agglomeration effects that characterize the history of cities as well as exceeding the national boundaries, establishing a new continuum between the local and the global scale. Smart-phones, Wi-Fi, IoTs, clouds, 4G, and block-chains, with their exponential diffusion, have not only based their success on an energy-intensive utilization of AI techniques, generating an acceleration in the creation, transmission storing, and retrieval of geo-referenced data from people, machines, devices, and sensors. Moreover, they have fostered the creation of new less intermediated forms of economic organization, which are progressively substituting the traditional relationships between capital, labor and space. At the same time, they have also created a growing competition for the production of data that can support their role, as well as ensure the control and government of such service platforms. This paper, based on a grounded approach, argues the need of exploring the already visible dramatic socio-economic and spatial impact on cities and places, generated by the rise of cyber-capital and the platform economy, as well as critically contributing to support public agencies in rethinking the traditional mechanisms for value creation, capturing and redistribution.

ABSTRACT. The purpose of this presentation is to provide the history of the Hudson Yards (HY) and offer background information on the circumstances that lead to its design and construction such as when it was built, the design considerations and its function. The presentation will focus on how Hudson Yards implement smart city development features that include but are not limited to the engineering of the space based on sustainable components to reduce carbon emissions, efficient use of soil, air circulation, and independent energy sources. Overall, the presentation is a setting of the stage for conversations about the participation of prosumer in the dual engagement on digital platforms and the spaces of the city. The smart city ecosystem of the Hudson Yards will include descriptions and function of the different buildings and spaces that conform the HY such as the public architecture of “The Vessel”, the cultural center “The Shed,” the observation deck “The Edge,” the vertical retail shopping mall area proper, and the main public space plaza “The Hudson Yards Public Square” designed by architects well known globally. The Hudson Yards website will also be described and analyzed to provide a comprehensive account of the development. The notion of digital citizen and users of public space will be further explored to characterize the application of smart city development features in Hudson Yards, New York City.

ABSTRACT. Today digitalization becomes embedded into urban settings and is often used to tackle several different aspects of the wicked problems cities are facing, such as safety, travels, food supply, energy supply. At the same time there are demands to govern and plan for more sustainable urban living. The smart city builds on profound levels of information and knowledge sharing and integration through new digital tools among diverse population groups, stakeholders, and organizations. Smart technologies are not just the artefacts in the hands of the users of smart phones, watches, and computers; it is now also embedded in extensive networks that connect, track and generate data from and to the users (through user apps, surveillance cameras, digital location monitoring, etc), thus the access to, use (or non-use) and interpretations of technology differs among those living in and visiting the smart city. However, the access and use to the smart city is unevenly distributed and used in different ways.

This paper aims to present, conceptualize and critically discuss a scoping review of current research focus on socio-economic diversity and inclusion in the smart cities, with a specific focus on how social and economic dimensions of sustainable development are integrated into technical tools for smart cities.

The paper presents the results from an extensive scoping review, that is structured, analyzed and discussed in relation to how inclusion, participation is addressed in the studies. In addition, our analyses of the review is discussed in Delfi-inspired focus group interviews to further elaborate on meanings and implications for governance and planning of how (smart) cities can shape the future for everyone.

The main contribution of the paper is to combine the smart city literature with discussions about inclusion, integration and socio-economic aspects of the wicked problems related to challenges of governance and planning of (smart) cities.

ABSTRACT. Since the arrival of the automobile and the ideals of modernism, city planning has placed great importance on private vehicles. It has allocated more and more space for roads and parking, segregating land uses and prioritizing private versus public space. As a result, planning neglected the pedestrian, and the quality of the public realm declined. In recent decades there has been an impetus for reclaiming spaces for pedestrians, and these efforts require strategies based on thorough spatial analysis.   To understand the city as a living organism, it is important to observe how this organism works on a day-by-day basis. The study of human behaviour in built environments also called the study of public life, is the systematic observation and analysis of people in built spaces. It’s an approach to understanding how the city is being used by its inhabitants and can provide insight into which pedestrian spaces are successful and which need help.   With the use of drone technology and artificial intelligence, a methodology was developed to observe and analyze the use of the public realm and to understand the public-private interface. A drone recorded pedestrians, cyclists and vehicles over a busy intersection in Zurich for five days. Artificial intelligence was used to process the 4K video to spatially analyze the use of the public realm. Based on these observations, design modification and strategies were recommended for the built form and the public realm.

This project contributes to a better understanding of emerging technologies in our field and their applicability to urban design and planning. Combining these new technologies with current methods can be a powerful tool for public engagement in reshaping our cities.

ABSTRACT. The place experience in the contemporary city, in the era of digital platforms, is based on digitally generated, personalised and filtered information. It is multiplied through the simultaneous coexistence of various digital representations of places. They form a time-varying place assemblage, composed of material, social, cultural and digital layers. The mechanisms of digital platforms, functioning as gatekeepers for this information, seek to expose and marginalise selected parts of urban space. Therefore, they lead to the creation of specific perceptions and expectations about a place, influencing the spatial behaviour of users. Moreover, they shaping attitudes towards places and memories, which are often only a reflection of our digital presence in that place, mixing real experiences with digital ones. Digital platforms allow us to interact with different spatial and social contexts, embodied through them. They also become a broader element of place experience. Digital platforms will be perceived through the prism of spatial media, which are a range of digital technologies that use the user's location and maps. The growing importance of these technologies affects the digital transformations of society. It has been evident during and in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic that digital platforms are key to city functioning. In consequence their role in modifying the human experience of place, as well as the reconfiguration of power and surveillance relations through these technologies is growing. The aim of the presentation is to determine how the increasing platformisation of the city affects the place experience through the manipulation of digital content and to further identify digital platforms functions in the process of digital placemaking. The research was conducted in 2021 in Poznan, Poland, using individual in-depth interviews, a questionnaire survey and spatial analysis.

ABSTRACT. From classic elitist and pluralist theories of community power to urban regime and network governance concepts academic studies tell us that several institutional and individual actors with no electoral democratic legitimacy may have significant impact on local government decision-making. In our paper we ask question who they are in contemporary Polish cities? And are there any systematic regularities in this respect concerning e.g. how they differ depending on the size of local community? In this paper we look at the phenomenon through the lenses of citizens’ perception. Data is collected through the survey experiment conducted on the representative sample of 2000 Polish citizens who are asked about their perception of the impact of various business and societal actors. The study uses the survey experiment method in which various formulations of the question are randomly assigned to individual respondents, which allows us to measure the perceived influence of individual types of actors. Referring to the recent debate on limitation of applicability of regime theory to large cities only, we place a special attention to the impact of city size on the role of big and small businesses as well as various societal organizations.

ABSTRACT. Over recent decades, cities, especially European cities, are experiencing profound physical, functional, cultural, and social transformations which can be summarized as historic centers coming into confliction with new territorial dynamics of spatial appropriation. In the macro context, such transformations are associated with multiple factors such as migratory flows, the relocation of social interaction from the arena of public space, the effects of a pandemic and the consequences of deindustrialisation. In the study of cities, public space acquires a central role. It allows us to "read" the city, informing planners and other social actors of the way actual territorial dynamics have come to be organized over periods of time. As a plural space, public space, brings together multiple experiences and aggregates difference, thus, therefore, in our opinion, it could also function as an effective toolset in the development of inclusive and participatory cities.

Looking into the case of a specific square, São Paulo square situated in the context of Lisbon, Portugal, we intend to clarify the concept of public space, as both object and subject, to analyse its transformations over time and to reflect on the main challenges of the territorial dynamics and the current urban mechanisms and strategies impacting upon that space. We intend to assess the impact of public policies and to better understand how these policies have influenced and conditioned such territorial transformations in both pre- and post-pandemic contexts, highlighting the birth of new social practices and lifestyles. We also aim to contribute to the knowledge of how urban spaces operate upon their occupants positive, and that way foreground how public space, read in this way, can represent an interface through which we might reprogram the cultural identity of an environment i.e. restoring the sense of belonging, building new narratives and spatial identities and promoting better urban connections.

ABSTRACT. A series of ongoing crises have deeply affected our contemporary societies: namely, the climate crisis, the Covid-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. These events posed serious challenges to local authorities, which had to address the aftermaths of these crises, especially when their local impact has been neglected by central states. In addition to acting alone, cities collectively mobilised through their membership in transnational municipal networks, such as Eurocities and C40, to find support and solutions to the problems caused by the multiple crises. In turn, the latter brought about noteworthy transformations in the practices and political stance of the members of inter-urban networks. First, cities have been on the front-line, acting concretely to tackle these emergencies. Second, cities expressed their firm position on these critical situations, enhancing the role of cities as strong and credible actors. Finally, the recent multiple crises exacerbated central-local relations, with increasing attempts to strengthen city-to-city cooperation to find allies other the state to deal with contemporary societal issues. Consequentially, the current crises boosted city diplomacy, with urban leaders rallying to make their voice heard by upper-level authorities. Moreover, city networks took a stand on salient political matters, displaying a distinctive political ethos. By examining how the above-mentioned crises have shaped contemporary transnational municipalism, this paper will reflect on the recent evolution of European inter-city cooperation. From a theoretical viewpoint, the paper will bring in conversation two strands of theories: network governance and paradiplomacy, which help cast light onto cities’ international stance and their role in the governance of contemporary critical events.

ABSTRACT. During the Covid-19 lockdowns our eyes were opened to new uses of urban spaces and possible ways to stimulate and introduce new opportunities for both re- and new development of the functions and life of the town center. People started meeting each other in the open, indoor activities such as gyms moved outdoors, cafés became mobile, and urban parks and green spaces suddenly had many more visitors than before. Possibly, some of these new uses may even be pointing at prospective and more sustainable and perhaps even healthier practices for the urban population compared to previous (often entirely commercial) uses of urban public spaces. Obviously, there is a somewhat darker side to this development as the Covid-19 pandemic accelerated an already on-going development in town centers in which shop closures, dying city life, and emptying of high streets characterises urban landscapes in many cities and not least in small and medium-sized towns. The crisis in the town center is, however, not caused by the pandemic. Economic centralisation, concentration and restructuring, and growth in electronic commerce are long term trends that is further fueled by the current energy crisis and inflation. Based on a literature review it is explored in the paper how the new opportunities for development in public urban spaces, that mushroomed during the pandemic, can be utilized in a turnaround. What does it take, organisationally, economically, and socially, invigorating the town centre by means of the introduction of new types of activity, for-profit and non-profit alike? ------- Possibly the paper could fit track 6 Resilient city as well?

ABSTRACT. The adoption of smart city agendas and policies in urban tourism destinations is perceived as a new stage in tourism planning towards cleaner, more efficient and more inclusive destinations. In this context, Europe boasts a large number of the world’s top urban destinations that offer a unique context for the deployment of smart destination solutions. However, the operational understanding and the challenges of integrating tourism as a critical element of smart city development, as well as the assessment of the real impact of smart solutions at the local level, remain underrepresented topics in the academic literature. The main goal of this paper is therefore to fill this gap through an analysis of the positions, discourses and degrees of representation of a sample of stakeholders of different type, as public administration officials, industry representatives and innovation agents, social and grassroots movements, and ICT sector, that are - or should be - part of the tourism planning and ‘smart city’ ecosystems in selected urban destinations across Europe, around various tourism-related challenges for those cities, such as the future of tourism, its social impacts, and the transitions to sustainability, all issues in which ‘smartening up’ the urban destination could play a pivotal role. This analysis uses discourse and sentiment analysis through an innovative methodology based on LDA topic detection, which allows to tracks and orders a significant number of stakeholders’ opinions on a real-time basis, and identifies the opportunities for collaboration in alignments of opinions and activities. We expect to shed light on the key challenges and opportunities for governance in cities where ‘smart’ is expected to represent a turning point for coping with the transformations triggered by tourism. In general terms, the results of our analysis support a critical vision of the capacity of smart city agendas to adapt to such challenges.

ABSTRACT. Climate crisis and biodiversity loss have forced cities to adopt sustainability objectives into their policies. Through their decision-making, cities play a crucial role in both contributing to and combating environmental crises. As cities are estimated to be responsible for 70-80 % of greenhouse gas emissions (Hoornweg et al. 2011; IIASA 2012) and as the consequences of sustainability crises are felt locally, cities are key agents in sustainability transformation.

The purpose of the paper is to suggest a new conceptualization of the sustainability agency of cities. We scrutinize what kind of agency is needed for cities to promote sustainability transformation. We build the paper theoretically on extant literature on local governance and agency in sustainability transformation. The empirical part of the paper consists of inductive analysis of interview data. The data consist of 22 interviews with local government civil servants in two Finnish municipalities: Ii and Lahti, both of which have been active in adopting sustainability policies to mitigate, and adapt to, the changes. In the analysis, we explore the space of possibilities and impossibilities in local government civil servants’ speech about sustainable development.

The shift in local governance to new public governance emphasizes the importance of networks, collaboration, and mutual trust. In line with this, cities are seen as enablers serving as collaborative platforms creating and offering possibilities for other actors who contribute to the policymaking system and public service delivery. (See e.g., Osborne 2006; Stoker 2011; Bao et al. 2013; Dickinson 2016). The enabler role is important also in how sustainably cities are designed, planned and governed (Puppim de Oliveira et al. 2010). Our study shows, however, that in the context of sustainability transformation, the enabler role is not sufficient, but cities also need to act as boundary-setters to fit their operations and impacts within the planetary boundaries.

ABSTRACT. Urban systems are paramount for tackling the current global socio-ecological challenges. Scholars call for new urban planning and governance approaches to deal with these. Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) is an environmental policy tool that promotes and integrates sustainability into decision-making processes. SEA analyses plans, programmes or policies' effects on the environment and communities. It is a systematic, strategic and participatory approach. This research explores how the main actors (practitioners, decision-makers, and the public) typically involved in SEA processes develop their roles and how far they affect SEA toward sustainability. We conduct a case-study approach, using 12 SEA of Urban Master Plans (UMP) in Portugal to analyse their consultation process. Following a qualitative research design, we analyse the SEA consultation reports and the reasoned opinions on the type of contributions provided by participants and their outputs. We found that the overall process is highly bureaucratic, hindering the interactions between the different actors and providing limited engagement. Consultation with civil society and public authorities mainly occurs in an advanced process phase, when the most relevant decisions have been taken. Also, there is an imbalanced power relation among SEA actors, with discretionary powers of some to act upon the outcome of the process. We found that practitioners can profoundly influence the results of the participation process and that civil society does not have a legitimate opportunity to engage with it. All participation processes support established governance systems and public decision-making structures, leading to "business-as-usual" undermining the necessary paradigm shift to tackle local (and global) sustainability challenges. Overall, SEA lacks transparency and accountability. Finally, some guiding directions for improvements towards a more collaborative, dynamic, and iterative process are provided. Participation by the public should be enforced, informed and advised by public entities, mediated and implemented by practitioners, and supported by the decision-makers.

ABSTRACT. Facing climate change and the uncertain future, we share a Net-Zero goal. Therefore, CO2 offset has been regarded as a key issue globally. Since different albedo in pavement and building material has been proven to have a positive effect on reducing CO2, the research aims to develop a CO2 offset strategy through cool pavement to help urbans become much more sustainable. We use life cycle assessment (LCA) of road pavement to find out the best deployment of different material of road pavement that bring the highest CO2 reduction. The energy waste in transporting and building pavement material are considered in the research, and vehicle excess fuel consumption, excess building energy demand, direct Radiative Forcing as well. However, the effective of CO2 reduction in pavement is various in different area result from combined effect of different contributor, such as geographical condition, population, climate condition, etc. As the result, Taipei and Tainan city in Taiwan are chosen to be study areas, which are urbans in different climate zone with different building density and population. We try to understand the potential effect of road pavement material on CO2 offset in urban with different geographical and climate condition.

ABSTRACT. Coastal areas have confronted the threat of climate change at imminence due to the vicinity to sea. However, people who reside along coastal areas are less willing to migrate for strong sense of place dependence. In order to response to the uncertainty of climate change, many countries attempt to apply land use planning to help building resilience in coastal communities. Among the land use planning strategies, retreat is one kind of strategy to change land use by migrating residents. In fact, retreat is not only improving both exposure of disaster and vulnerability in the coastal communities but also improving the living environment for salt marshes, intertidal zones, and other coastal ecosystems. In addition, the outcome of retreat might further reduce the speed of coastal erosion and increase carbon capture and storage. Therefore, proactive retreat might become a major issue in response to climate change in high-risk coastal areas. Based on the above, this research focuses on exploring the impact of the retreat strategy on coastal land use change by establishing land use model to analyze the effectiveness of retreat regulations in reducing disaster risks in coastal areas. There are three analytical methods applied including multilayer perceptron (MLP), simweight, and logistic regression for model calibration and verification. Afterwards, the study then selects model which is the highest accuracy to take retreat strategy into simulation. According to the literature review, the study will gather direct and indirect parameters which impact on disaster risk, and the study will then analyze the improving effect of retreat on disaster risk along coastal areas.

ABSTRACT. Since the adoption of Agenda 21 at the UN Conference in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, cities have been considered to play a central role in achieving global sustainability goals. Numerous cities around the world are fulfilling this task by using innovative and comprehensive policy tools. A considerable variety in the usage of policy instruments can be observed among German cities: While some are involved in global sustainability networks, set up topic-specific staff units, develop sustainability strategies or make a binding commitment to systematic monitoring of their sustainability progress, other cities do not even address the topic in press releases or on their municipal homepage. In Germany, sustainability policy regularly falls within the scope of voluntary municipal tasks. Legally binding requirements from higher levels hardly exist. Moreover, sustainability policies are characterised by several properties that should actually make them unattractive for cities to be worked on. Additionally, sustainability policies have to be driven forward by cities under the general conditions of financial, time and personnel constraints together with an increasing burden of tasks. Is it thus possible to identify general factors that promote sustainability commitment in German cities? This article addresses this question with the help of a multi-level regression analysis of the sustainability policies of 189 cities in 2021. This is the first quantitative analysis to examine the influence of various socio-economic, institutional and political factors, which have been shown to have explanatory power in the international research literature on urban sustainability policy and in the research literature on local policy-making in Germany. To measure sustainability commitment, a new dataset was created by using internet sources, in which the sustainability policy instruments of 189 large and medium-sized cities were systematically recorded, coded and finally aggregated into an index.

ABSTRACT. This paper intends to present a theoretical contribution to frame innovative approaches to urban policies, particularly regarding contexts where climate, social and economic challenges are at stake. By exploring the concepts of Creativity based policies and Creative Territories, it argues for the need of dialogue arenas, representation and territorialization as conditions for innovation in urban policies. Creative territories are those that enable innovative social and political devices that allow for the visibility, enactment, and construction of forms of knowledge and political action. They are deeply democratic in nature. Creative territories also point to paths of sustainability by allowing to combine knowledge and practices so often absent from the most politically visible arenas. The initiative of the European Commission – the New European Bauhaus – which seeks to bring together knowledge from different disciplines, arts, architecture, engineering, urbanism, and design, seems a step in this direction. The paper is organized as follows: it starts by clarifying the concept of urban policy innovation; it is followed by the identification of major urban challenges and their policy drivers and consequences; and the bulk of the paper will deal with the discussion of the main features of Creativity Based Policies.

ABSTRACT. European cities are increasingly relying on transnational cooperation for building their resilience in the face of common challenges. Interurban networks such as EUROCITIES and Placemaking Europe play a crucial role in this process by enabling the communication and exchange between urban actors from different places and sectors. The current knowledge about the European interurban networks mostly derives from the experiences of the core EU cities, although they are not geographically contained to the European Union. How those networks function in more peripheral cities and spill over the EU borders remains unexplored. This question becomes particularly important for cities in the EU candidate countries, such as those in the Western Balkans, which face complex and urgent urban challenges from environmental degradation and spatial inequalities to weak regulation of land use and democratic backsliding. Does the European urban agenda, focused on just, green and productive cities, affect the resilience of Balkan cities in the face of these challenges, and what is the role of interurban networks in that process? To answer this question, I present the preliminary results of the research on the participation of the actors from Zagreb, Belgrade, Pristina, Sarajevo, Podgorica, Skoplje, and Tirana in European networks dealing with urban development. This mix-method research combines affiliation network analysis with interviews with network members, to quantitatively and qualitatively assess the potential of the European networks to influence the sustainable urban transformation of the Balkans. While the former confirms and maps the affiliations of Balkans cities in various European networks, the latter indicates their variegated influence due to the socio-political context, path dependencies and reproduction of the centre-periphery relations that persist in networks. In conclusion, the paper calls for the decentering of European urban research and practice and their extension beyond EU borders to become more context-sensitive inclusive and relevant.

ABSTRACT. Viable Cities is a nation-wide municipal climate network including 23 cities in Sweden. In 2020, Viable Cities introduced the Swedish Climate City Contract 2030 to accelerate cities transition to climate neutrality by 2030. This working method has served as an inspirational guide to develop a climate contract at a European level for cities participating in the EU mission “100 European climate-neutral and smart cities by 2030”. The city of Malmö, Sweden was one of the first cities to sign and implement these climate city contracts.

The aim of this is to address how Viable Cities influences the urban climate governance structures and mechanisms established in a city for addressing climate change mitigation challenges. More specifically, the study assesses the internal process for coordinating with local private actors through the implementation of a climate city contract. The analysis builds on a case study of the City of Malmö, which is based on surveys and a focus group discussion with 17 private entities.

The results of this study will contribute to the discussion on the emergence and effect of a transnational municipal climate network as an intermediary for facilitating a local-level partnership. This can be seen through the implementation of the climate contract in Malmö that unlocks a multi-actor process, in which private businesses are integrated. Operationalizing this kind of cross-sector partnership may allow participants to jointly share sustainability solutions through testbeds, and break away from the segregation of sectors into silos. The paper will discuss how this can be facilitated by the climate contract process.

ABSTRACT. The ambitious aims of the New Urban Agenda (UN Habitat) can best be achieved in countries where definitive national urban policies exist, based on the principles of sustainable and inclusive development. This is the case, however, only in a few EU countries, while in the large majority of countries the lack of such policy is mitigated by some kind of cooperation between the large cities and their national governments, along the same principles. This paper concentrates on a third group of countries, where no national urban policy exists and there is no cooperation between the large cities and the national government, due to conflicting political relations. In Europe this case is most visible in Hungary, Poland and Turkey. The paper concentrates on the case of Hungary and Budapest. The Hungarian national government is a strong amd powerful gatekeeper of urban development, regarding both regulation and financing. Since the 2019 local elections Budapest turned into opposition to the national government, and the city has built up a new vision for long-term sustainable and inclusive urban development, which is radically different from the ideas and policies of the narional government. Since then, in the course of the ever growing conflicts, the national government aims to cripple the capital with political, financial and regulatory tools. Although the city tries to reach political compromises, in most issues the differences are insurmountable. The analysis reveals some interesting details of this battle: to what extent can the sustainability aims of the city be achieved under the very unfavourable conditions, what are the chances of the city to find domestic alliances to the progressive local visions, and what are the best options for the capital to turn to external players, such as large cities of other countries or the EU itself?

ABSTRACT. Research shows that responses to institutional collective action dilemmas and “wicked problems” have been remarkably different across countries and geographical regions. This study contributes to the literature by examining how these strategies are applied in an often-overlooked region: the Balkans. Previously scholars have investigated regional governance arrangements in numerous European settings: Finland, Norway, The Netherlands, France, Italy, Switzerland, Portugal, Belgium, and the United Kingdom to name a few. The focus of this research is on the work of regional intergovernmental organizations (RIGOs) in Bulgaria. These organizations represent a distinct type of voluntary interlocal collaborations. They are of various sizes, represent diverse missions in numerous policy arenas, and engage in various regional projects. Municipalities from different districts, civil society organizations, and other social groups are now sharing resources and building administrative capacities as they jointly tackle new and emerging challenges. Examining the work of these multipurpose municipal associations (MMAs) in Bulgaria provides us with an opportunity to operationalize a range of factors and conditions that can contribute to comparative studies of European local government initiatives. The research relies on qualitative comparative analysis (QCA) to examine the relationships between characteristics of inter-municipal cooperation initiatives and their effectiveness. To address the research question this study examines the presence of necessary and sufficient conditions that can help in explaining the efficacy of Bulgarian MMAs. In particular, the research evaluates whether size, focus, resources, and decision making (Rickabaugh, 2018) are necessary and sufficient conditions for the success of these RIGOs.

ABSTRACT. The paper investigates the factors that are associated with the occurrence of democratic innovation tools in Czech cities with a focus on the gender and age of the mayor. Key characteristics of the different leadership styles of mayors and councillors are their age and their gender. Younger representatives are more likely to look for innovative modes of government than older mayors and councillors (see Heinelt 2013). This is especially the case in post-communist countries where the older political elite was socialised under totalitarian regimes that were hostile to civic participation. However, a recent change in the beliefs and opinions of new generation in a democratic society is challenging the traditional modes of government and we can assume that the younger generation of mayors is more open to new forms of governance while older mayors are more likely to prefer an authoritarian leadership style. Similarly, gender can also be associated with different leadership styles, as women prefer collective and participatory decisions over authoritarian decision-making. They might prefer civic participation and the involvement of multiple actors in municipal politics more.

The data analysis of major Czech cities suggests that municipalities with female mayors tend to be associated with a higher frequency of participatory techniques. Results thus mirror the findings from the large scale international individual level survey of mayors and councillors’ opinions on the notion of democracy. Female councillors support participatory governance more than male councillors, while male councillors are significantly more in favour of representative democracy than female councillors. The analysis based on the real policy data suggests that the opinions of councillors and mayors and their positions towards participatory and representative democracy are not only proclamations, but also have real policy consequences, because municipalities government by older councillors and mayors tend to implement less democratic reforms.

ABSTRACT. The current UK government appears very keen to promote devolution through the levelling up agenda. Some of this is clearly aimed at forms of regional government, although confusingly described as devolving to the local. There is also a clear push to encourage sub-municipal organisations to get involved due to their close links with the community. In fact, the government is very keen for the establishment of sub-municipal organisations to assist in this levelling up agenda. Within the documentation, parish and town councils – the most obvious form of sub-municipal government – hardly get a mention. The creation of such bodies is not mentioned. Yet these bodies can be among the most effective routes in finding out what services are needed and how to deliver them. Such sub-municipalities are prominent in rural England. There are over 9000 sub-municipalities, the vast majority of which are ‘rural’ or ‘semi-rural’. There are some large urban sub-municipalities – Queen’s Park, the city of Salisbury, Sutton Coldfield, to name but three. Yet these are a distinct minority. The aim of this paper is to explore why such sub-municipalities are so rare in England. Some of this is down to a lack of sub-local leadership. In other instances, local councils have devolved small amounts of expenditure to the ward level, and have encouraged the creation of neighbourhood councils. There is also the issue of identity. People may, for example, describe themselves as living in a particular suburb of a town or city - but only to fellow residents of said city, or those who live nearby. This lack of identity is problematic. Of central government was to push for the perishing of all of England, there would be significant issues in drawing the boundaries of the proposed parishes, as well as the allocation of powers and finances.

ABSTRACT. We still know surprisingly little about the link between the descriptive and substantive representation of women at the local level. Despite the fact that local governments are responsible for important policy areas and have considerable policy discretion, it is not clear to what extent changes in the gender composition of local authorities affect policy outcomes. Although the amount of literature tracing the influence of female decision-makers on local policy outcomes is increasing, the evidence is somewhat mixed and limited to selected countries and policies. In this paper, we employ quasi-experimental research schemes (difference-in-differences & regression discontinuity) to study selected local policies in Polish municipalities: childcare, elderly care, and social assistance. We aim to test if there is a causal link between the election of a female mayor and the welfare provision.

ABSTRACT. Participatory processes in the built environment are usually delivered through traditional tools such as design workshops, panels, and discussion groups. The reasons behind using these mediums may vary but turning them into tokenistic instruments to legitimise the decision-making process is the most common motivation especially when governmental agencies and private developers are on the lead. The establishment of this pseudo-effect of participation does not tend to produce sustainable permanent outcomes, thus creating a negative image of participatory processes. To reverse this negative perception, this paper proposes the reading of community participation as a long-term process embedded in the everyday life instead of a one-off and strictly planned temporary practice and, instead, focusing on `Communities of Practice (CoP)` as the main actor of this process. Thanks to personal experiences and observations that I have gained in a community organisation over almost two years in a residential neighbourhood in Newcastle, I have a chance to see the reflection of the CoP concept in real life, their long-term effects on communities and how community action in a spatial practice can be shaped within daily social practices in the context of neighbourhoods. Following these experiences, this paper claims that CoP fosters and strengthens neighbourhood relationships, community engagement and a sense of belonging, all of which are significant elements of sustainable participation processes. In addition, instead of referring only to a selected group of people, CoP become a more inclusive setting for all grassroots including seniors, youth, children and migrants in urban spaces. That is why the Community of Practice theory can be used to capture the hidden power and knowledge of active citizens and local communities for the sake of their living environments.

ABSTRACT. In times of uncertainty related to the contemporary, global threats and the centralization trends observed in European countries such as Hungary or Poland, cities need allies at all levels of government. Representation in the national (central) parliament becomes one of the important channels of access to the state-level policy making. Our research aims to determine what role previous experience of working in local government plays in a parliamentary career. Political science concepts that adopt a hierarchical model will indicate that the function in local government can be seen/treated as a springboard for a career at a higher level (or possibly a waiting room in the event of failure). Other approaches, assuming the equality of these career paths and the existence of local identity, will perceive ex-local government politicians in the parliament as heralds of local government issues. In our paper, we will verify the springboard hypothesis and the heralds hypothesis using data on the behaviour of ex-local government politicians in the national parliament. Our main research question is: Do ex-local government politicians use their experience gained at the local level in the parliament? Especially, • Are they more likely than their colleagues without this point in their CVs to speak in the parliament about bills concerning local government, undertake interpellations, or sit on committees related to local government? • Does any experience in local government make one an advocate of the local government “cause” and small homelands? Or does the length and type of work at local level matter? Empirically our study is based on the analysis of career paths and parliamentary behaviours of 460 MPs currently in office. The database was provided by the Union of Polish Metropolises.

ABSTRACT. The input focuses on the role of networks in forming place-based leadership for territorial governance in different rural, suburban and urban municipalities in Lithuania. The main objective is to analyze the relations between the social-economic context and conditions for developing place-based governance in different localities that face different demographic, economic and social challenges. The statistical data define existing patterns of territorial inequality in Lithuania within classical dual rural/urban differentiation where urban territories have more competitive advantage compared to rural ones. The variation between different social and economic indicators demonstrates that the capital area including the other two large cities signifies intensive multi-centered economic development compared with the rest of the rural regions. Based on the cases studies from rural, suburban and urban municipalities we argue that territorial governance and leadership is important aspect to consider for urban regeneration and territorial development policies in different tailored modes. Territorial governance is understood as “the process of territorial organization of the multiplicity of relations that characterize interactions among actors and different, but non-conflictual, interests” (Davoudi et al., 2008; Atkinson et al.,2019). The role of local leadership refers to power allocation, trust building and development of horizontal coalitions (Beer, Clower, 2014). Comparing these urban, suburban and rural cases through the lens of territorial governance and local leadership concepts contribute to understanding of territorial place-based approach and role of formal and informal forms of collective action. The empirical qualitative data derives from the COHSMO research project “Inequality, Urbanization and Territorial Cohesion: Developing the European Social Model of Economic Growth and Democratic Capacity” (Horizon2020 Program) implemented in the period 2018 to 2021. The project addresses social inequalities and socio-economic differences between neighborhoods, cities and regions across European countries and points the relevance of a territorial perspective in forming place-driven policies in social investment and territorial development.

ABSTRACT. People form different attachments to urban environment that is seen to embody the past or commonly regarded as heritage. Such engagements are considered to be foundational for a sense of belonging and community, and can thus be regarded as the very reason why heritage matters and needs to be safeguarded. However, such subjective issues tend to be ill suited to fit the ways urban areas are managed. Both cultural heritage management and urban planning are highly regulated fields and although public participation, with its shortcomings, has established itself, authorities and specialists dominate decision-making processes. But how do authorities attempt to incorporate the different attachment and engagement that people form with the urban landscape and cultural heritage into their administrative processes? The paper introduces an ongoing doctoral research project examining participation with respect to safeguarding cultural heritage of the urban environment. Two different cases from Iceland are examined by way of in-depth interviews and observational fieldwork identifying different perspectives and values people attach to urban heritage. The project also analyses the legal framework around cultural heritage as well as the approaches that authorities take to identify and interpret cultural heritage and its safeguarding. Drawing on the cases the paper addresses to what extent authorities have succeeded or failed in facilitating community dialog and involvement regarding safeguarding of urban heritage. In conclusion, the paper argues that an ethnographically informed understanding of how people engage with and attach meaning to urban heritage is imperative for enhancing participatory model in heritage management, designed to attract and facilitate participation from communities in negotiating the urban landscape.

ABSTRACT. Discussing political participation’s influence on political attitudes and support for democracy is one of the main themes of recent research. While there are many studies that analyze political participation at the local level, research completely neglects the differences in participation at the local and supra-local levels. The main aim of this paper is to analyze the extent to which pro-democracy attitudes are associated with political participation, specifically non-electoral political participation. Our research, which worked with unique data and compared participation rates at the local and supra-local levels in the Czech Republic, yielded surprising findings. Democracy appeared to have the highest support among citizens who are active in the community at the local level, usually through activities that seek to improve community life. In contrast, strong participation, especially in supra-local politics (regional and national), is often exercised by people who are weak democrats and are open to supporting authoritarianism. This is significant not only in terms of the current state of research on political participation but also in terms of some of the conventional assumptions in democratic theory about the influence of political participation on support for democracy.

ABSTRACT. Local Action Groups (LAGs) – as territorial development polities – have gained increased relevance in the last three decades. Some of these tailored deliberative polities have been in action since the 1990s, fostered and financed by the European Commission (EC) instrument LEADER. In the programming cycle of 2014-2020, they had the opportunity to expand their intervention area and access European Union (EU) multiple funds through the Community-Led Local Development (CLLD) EU policy initiative.

Since their inception, LAGs were sold on their capacity to better engage local stakeholder mobilization, proactiveness and capacity-building for the design and implementation of Local Development Strategies (LDS). In other words, LAG’s place-based, context-dependent structure, and agency were understood as a trigger for local governance innovation. Nonetheless, there is a standing critique on the role and impact of LAGs as spatial-temporal fixes and power rescaling mechanisms and capable of tackling pressing local issues by testing innovative governance arrangements, involving multi-level interaction and territorial rescaling.

This paper aims at providing a contribution to the governance innovation debate. Firstly, delving into the ethos of those engaged in the LAG, seeking the core meaning of their agency, based on their ethics and values, interests and power relations as a basis for praxis in the production of spatial-temporal fixes. Secondly, verifying the LAG agency impact in statutory government structures and territory boundaries in a process of power rescaling.

Spatially focusing on Lisbon Metropolitan Area, against the backdrop of ongoing Europeanisation dynamics and a soft turn in planning theory and practice, we present an overview of the LAG landscape in this territory and a case study portraying the possible nature of that role. The choice of a detailed narrative of the way both power and values work can shed some light on the contribution of LAGs to governance innovation in Europe.

ABSTRACT. Urban commons and the idea of the city as a commons are increasingly the subject of urban research as a response to the challenges of modern cities, wchich goes beyond the solutions offered by the market and the state [Foster, Iaione 2022; Polko, Czornik, Ochojski 2021]. Urban commons differ from traditional commons, therefore there is a need to adapt the principles of governing the commons formulated by Elinor Ostrom [1990] to the urban context. The aim of the paper is to deepen the knowledge about the commoning process that leads to the co-production and co-consumption of urban commons by local communities. The work uses qualitative research methods based on interviews with representatives of urban commoners and observations of communities in action in two Polish cities. The interviews and observations focus on finding factors that determine the sustainability of urban commons. Among the aspects examined are the composition of the group, the level of openness and inclusiveness of commoners, innovation in sharing and pooling urban resources, as well as coexistence with local authorities. An important aspect of the study is to show that the context matters, and the way to achieve the best solutions is often experimentation. The results of the research are useful for both urban communities and local authorities that are making efforts to support and strengthen participatory governance.

References: Foster S. R., Iaione C. (2022). Co-cities: Innovative Transitions Toward Just and Self-sustaining Communities. MIT Press. Polko A. (2022). Ekonomia miejskich dóbr wspólnych. Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Ekonomicznego w Katowicach, Katowice. Polko A., Czornik M., Ochojski A. (2021). Understanding the Urban Commons. Economics and Governance. Bogucki Wydanictwo Naukowe, Poznań.

ABSTRACT. This paper seeks to unravel underlying values and interests spurred by processes of urban climate transformation. The quest for a non-fossil and sustainable future is near-to utopian and requires massive changes in the ground structures of society – in the economy, in energy systems, in transport, land use. Climate transformation thus impacts people’s daily lives, their work, their community, and their way of living. This ‘intrusiveness’ of climate transformation is to a continually larger degree balanced by a call for climate transformation to be socially just. Motivated by this challenge, the paper seeks to identify different notions of justice in two key areas of urban climate transformation, urban densification and mobility, by comparing climate protests in Norway and Sweden’s largest cities. Our intent is to unravel different notions and meanings of justice that are active in critical urban climate governance processes – and to organize them into a set of key discourses. As ‘democracy’ and ‘freedom’, social justice is broad and vague, yet widely embraced, societal norm. Thus, to identify and analyse which values, arguments, world views, and interests that are operative in this field will help us to connect competing standpoints to broader theoretical understandings of social justice. The results may indicate areas of concern that transformative strategies should be sensitive to, and how transformative strategies may be realized in a just manner.

ABSTRACT. Increasingly inclusive development or inclusive growth has become a "buzzword" in the economic development and urban planning literature. While its usage has gained momentum, the exact definitions, frameworks, and measurements vary from context to context. Some describe the term as "conceptually fuzzy" and "operationally problematic"(Lee, 2019). The scale at which the concept is operationalized is also different, ranging from countries (Ianchovichina & Lundstrom, 2009; Samans, Blanke, Corrigan, & Drzeniek, 2015) to states (Aoyagi & Ganelli, 2015; van Niekerk, 2020) and cities (Pacetti, 2016; Ross, 2019; Steinberg & Lindfield, 2011). This paper runs a scope review of relevant reports of inclusive concepts. We provide a synthesis of the many concepts that have been offered to describe this concept. We continue to summarize the frameworks found in previous literature to capture the various dimensions of measuring an area's "inclusiveness." Our literature review found that much of the discussion focuses on the country level (cross-country comparison, Europe, etc.), with some recent works specifically focusing on "inclusive cities”. We systematically review the empirical literature on inclusive cities in several major urban journals gauging the timeline and topical patterns, and how they are related to the frameworks discussed above. This comprehensive review is one of the first to systematically summarize the different aspects of inclusive development and inclusive cities, thus providing important clarity to these concepts in their future discussions and usage in urban planning research across the world.

ABSTRACT. The Covid-19 pandemic, although in different manner and measure, has changed habits and use of places and cities at global level. Indeed, even before the pandemic, other changes were taking place including: an increase in the average age of people and new needs; the climate change that has changed the perception of places; diversified demands for ways of visit the places, also in line with the criteria of equity and accessibility for all; a use of social networks which runs the risk of drifting away people from the use of real places To study these transformations, new methods to analyse and/or design public spaces arisen which try to take in account new needs. Starting from this premises, aim of this work - carried out in the framework of the “PRIN2020 #20209F3A37” research project, within the author’s responsibility - is to illustrate both new urban methods and policy instruments and related indices, including: the 15-minutes city – namely a city able to offer to all its inhabitants everything they need to be reached on foot in no more than 15 minutes-, the flexible city - based on tools for urban planning and design, able to allow changes in the course of implementation of those projects -, the Soft City - based on the idea that from the union of density and diversity a more liveable and healthier city can be obtained -, the smart city – that with the support of technologies improve liveability and healthy and ensure sustainability-, and the Healthy Pl@ce Design method -which analyse people, their activities, elements, and factors useful to identify project interventions for liveable, inclusive and healthy places. Furthermore, related new indexes were created: the illustration of those which focuses on health, resilience, participation and inclusion issues will complete the paper.

ABSTRACT. The ‘No Net Land Take’ (NNLT) strategy broadly follows the framework of the compact city paradigm. This strategy has been put forward by the European Commission’s Roadmap to a Resource Efficient Europe (European Commission, 2011). It aims to reach land take neutrality by 2050, through densification or brownfield development.

Following the European level, different countries have set national and/or subnational targets to reduce land take. Following Bovet and Marquard (2022), it currently concerns Austria, France, Germany, Luxembourg, and Belgium. In Belgium, the NNLT strategy has been included in the strategic plans of the two main regions, i.e., Flanders and Wallonia. In both regions, the NNLT strategy is the subject of various concrete operational issues, including its impact on housing affordability.

Our presentation on the issue of housing affordability and the reduction of land take will be structured in two main parts. In the first part, we will synthetise a literature review. In the second part, we will discuss the current political debate in Wallonia. This will be based on materials gathered in the context of a governmental working group we had the opportunity to participate in as scientific expert. This participation has helped to highlight, on the one hand, the difference in perspectives between the scientific literature and the actors on the ground and, on the other hand, the developed strategies by the property and construction lobbies to limit the scope of the NNLT strategy.

Cited references - European Commission, 2011, COM (2011) 571, Roadmap to a Resource Efficient Europe, European Commission, Documentation and Data, Brussels: European Commission. - Bovet, J. and Marquard, E., 2022, Quantitative Targets, Tradable Planning Permits and Infrastructure Cost Calculator. Examples of Instruments Addressing Land Take in Europe, Springer International Publishing.

ABSTRACT. The era of dominance of human activities called as “Anthropocene” is result of increase in density of human population in cities. This has consequences and makes cities vulnerable to chronic stresses and sudden shocks. Climate change is both a result of high level of urbanization and create crisis in cities. Otherwise, urbanization causes vulnerabilities during pandemics due to accessibility problems. To seek for solutions to these problems, new approaches have been discussed. 15-minute cities and critical infrastructures are two of them. The main idea of 15-minute cities is being “compact, complete and connected” place, and Moreno’s 30-minute territory identifies a periphery that cover mode of mobilities such as electric vehicles or on-demand transport. It aims to be a solution to climate change by encouraging sustainable and zero-carbon micro-mobility. Also, because it increases connectivity and accessibility to major goods and services, it is very important to reach them under restricted access conditions such as pandemics. Critical infrastructures (CI) are included in terms of major goods and services in cities. CIs are systems, facilities, and networks that are important to functioning and well-being of population. Moreover, CIs are necessary goods and services, and they function interdependently. CIs cover technical, socio-economic sectors. Within the scope of this study, the critical infrastructure sectors in the 15-minute perimeters and 30-minute territory in the city of İzmir will be examined. The perimeters will be created based on different distances with walking, micro-mobility vehicles and transport. The perimeters will be generated by network analysis and mapped via GIS software. In results, it is expected to find out which critical infrastructure sectors can be reached in 15-minute and 30-minute distance in specified perimeters. This finding can guide the policy-makers to enhance the city's resilience in case of natural and man-made shocks in the near future.

ABSTRACT. Over the past decade, a growing number of scholars have sought to investigate the factors influencing local government transparency levels. This research covers a wide range of countries and local government systems, but so far has not been sufficiently systematized to allow the generalization of the findings. This paper employs meta-regression analysis to combine, compare, and synthesize research findings from more than 40 empirical studies on the determinants of municipal transparency.

ABSTRACT. Transparency is increasingly becoming an essential characteristic of political institutions. States and governments are enacting more stringent transparency rules in public administration in order to improve public management procedures, but also to increase citizens' trust and legitimacy in institutions. The academic expectations that link transparency and citizens' perceptions of government functioning and legitimacy are high: more and better transparency would lead to better-informed citizens and, therefore, more trust. For this relationship to happen, we need individuals' perceptions of institutional transparency to be clearly perceived and related to factual (real) transparency of institutions. However, there is a fundamental gap in research in this sense: there is no systematic and coherent evidence of the existence (or absence) of this mechanism. This work provides solid empirical evidence through the analysis of perceived transparency of a representative sample of 32,000 citizens from 80 municipalities in the metropolitan region of Barcelona, along with the institutional evaluation of the real transparency of their local governments. In this article we show that the gap between perceived and real transparency exists. Therefore, we provide empirical evidence to challenge the basic assumption that more and better transparency can generate trust in political institutions.

ABSTRACT. Waste management activities tend to be capital-intensive services that require coordination and information sharing due to their reliance on technology developments and technical expertise. Therefore, municipalities have been using intermunicipal cooperation (IMC) as a way to generate economies of scale increasing efficiency of service delivery without losing local autonomy. Yet, there is a tension between democracy and efficiency in the structure of intermunicipal cooperation, as these second tier organizations do not have direct election mechanisms that makes them accountable to citizens. One way to measure democratic principles to a second tier institution in charge of waste management is by focusing the attention in the procedure and performance of the institution. In this article, we argue that information sharing is one of the main dimensions of transparency that links democracy and efficiency in intermunicipal associations. The main argument is that homogeny of the members (regarding size, party and income level) helps information sharing as there is more trust between members. Contrary, our hypothesis is that information sharing when there is no homogeneity makes the institution more transparent without increasing trust, creating a situation of functional distrust. The article analyses the information sharing levels in the Consortium, a second tier institution in charge of waste sorting facilities and treatment plant, as well as other waste management activities.

ABSTRACT. The transparency regulations currently in force, in general, and in Spain in particular, are not designed for administrations that use algorithmic systems or artificial intelligence (AI) in decision-making procedures or in the design of public policies. One of the problems is that the duty of transparency and information access has not been generally applied to these systems because of a variety of reasons. Indeed, the obligations of transparency generally apply only to the city administration—public institution—but not to the private companies that develop algorithms, use them to run and manage services and functions of the city and, at the same time, use the legal framework to keep the algorithms secret and inaccessible to public scrutiny.

Barcelona is taking important steps to break this opacity regarding the use of these technologies. An example of this is the recent approval of the Protocol for the definition of work methodologies for the implementation of algorithmic systems. In the Spanish legal system, there are still no rules that oblige public administrations to adopt regulations such as the one that Barcelona has just approved. Moreover, it should be noted that this municipal protocol is not a hard law, it is simply a soft law regulation.

The aim of this paper is to critically assess the feasibility of the Barcelona Protocol and evaluate its impact on the private-public sector collaboration on the one hand, and on citizens’ trust in the public sector’s use of algorithms on the other. In other words, our question is whether this Protocol is enough to guarantee algorithmic transparency or if other additional measures should be taken to reinforce it. We also work out a few suggestions on how to make this Protocol easier to implement.

ABSTRACT. The task is to analyze immigrant’s involvement or engagement in Icelandic society by looking at their voter turnout in 2017 (parliamentary elections) and 2018 (local government elections). The aim with the study was to gain an insight into the inclusion of immigrants in Icelandic society – especially focusing on topics as language, employment, education, participation, culture and happiness. The data used was collected in the research and RANNÍS funded project: Inclusive Societies? The integration of immigrants in Iceland. An electronic survey among 2211 immigrants 18-80 years, was imple¬mented in the fall 2018, translated into 7 languages and containing 39 questions. Snowball sampling method was used. A total of 274 out of 1434 who answered they had the right to vote answered they voted in the Parliamentary Elections in 2017. The participation in the local elections 2018 was even better. A part of this analysis was published but in Icelandic. Among results is that: • Immigrant voter turnout is much lower than among the voters as a whole but much higher in the Local elections • Immigrant voter turnout (local) seems to be a little lower than in the in neighboring countries • Immigrant women are significantly more active voters than men • Immigrant voter turnout increases with age – as is the case when looking at all voters Other similar studies in the field will be discussed as for example civic engagement measured in other areas as general activity and media use. Connection with trust in institutions will also be discussed.

ABSTRACT. The aim of this paper would be to illustrate how interactions between local actors guide the implementation of a local development project. More specifically it would present some insights after one year of on-site empiric research period in one of Italian’s ‘inner areas.’

In 2014, the Italian government launched the National Strategy for Inner Areas (NSIA). This policy targets those territories that are distant from centres providing a range of essential services (education, health, and mobility). The main goal of the NSIA is to reverse demographic trends and to convert these territories into places of op¬portunities. To achieve this objective, the strategy relies on in a multi-level governance approach, where the local governments establish and carry out territorial development policies. Nevertheless, there are some relevant steps on the implementation at the local level that still need to be discussed.

This paper would present the outputs of a case study. The context analysed by the research concerns the Bormida Valley, one of the three first pilot SNAI project areas in the Piedmont Region. The empirical research provides some insights on how the local partnership impacts over the implementation of the NSIA project through answering some specific research questions: Who coordinates and how do they coordinate? What are the profiles and administrative level of decision-makers? What are the relations between them? What are the negotiation methods? What are the arrangements for managing procedures, timetables, deadlines, contents?.

The insights are the result of empiric research, participatory observation, interviews and first-hand experience. The paper will illustrate some outputs product of a close look at the case-study implementation process. It looks to contribute to the Track through an identification of measures, actions and tools that have been implemented to improve institutional capacity and efficiency of local institutions.

ABSTRACT. Within the United States, urban development has traditionally functioned as a method of capital development in historically ghettoized and economically “blighted” neighborhoods. This process has looked like increasing land values, raising rental costs, and displacing long-term residents from their neighborhoods. The process of urban development can be understood through the lens of racial capitalism as an appropriation of land lived on by Black and brown people, for the profit of financial and corporate institutions.

Within the context of racial capitalism, my research investigates strategies for ethical urban development, one in which working-class community needs for safe, healthy and environmentally sustainable neighborhoods can exist alongside permanent affordability and other market-taming forces. This research holds significance for gentrifying neighborhoods in cities not only throughout the United States, but in rapidly financializing urban land markets in metropolitan areas worldwide.

In order to inform these strategies of ethical urban development, my research looks at the Better Neighborhoods, Same Neighbors Initiative in East Oakland. This Initiative is a collaborative community effort, with community-based organizations partnering with Oakland city government and housing developers to envision ways to create climate change resiliency in the neighborhood of East Oakland. Although only in its second year, the Initiative showcases an outline for how urban planners can design an ethical, community-led urban development process.

The results of my research are relevant for discussions on city resilience and urban change. Working class urban communities of color such as those in East Oakland are amongst the most at-risk from the harmful impacts of climate change, which are compounded by existing environmental health issues caused by structurally entrenched environmental racism. When paired with changing demographics through resident displacement, it is clear that innovative community development approaches, like those modeled by the Better Neighborhoods, Same Neighbors Initiative, are needed to address pressing urban challenges.

ABSTRACT. Cities are multidimensional, uncertain, complex phonemes that require a concrete understanding of human rights and their dimensions for governance. The issue of housing as a fundamental human right and its boundaries for just and democratic implementation has a long history of debate among scholars, philosophers, and policymakers. Affordability and adequacy are the reflections of leading indicators of the right to housing as a human right in the realm of urban planning. The issue of justice in the right to housing and affordability in the unique cross-border region of Grand Genève (Great Geneva), located between Switzerland and France, is one of the primary concerns of urban planners and policymakers. This investigation, focusing on the issue of justice in the right to housing, investigates the role and approaches of urban governance in Great Geneva through separate layers and among involved actors. The study shows how the right to housing evolved into a multidimensional socio-spatial and financial issue for citizens. The research investigates how socio-spatial factors can exclude citizens with unique profiles (lower income groups or non-EU nationalities) from democratic and just participation in competitive housing markets. An investigation in a case study shows the new definition of housing affordability beyond solely economic dimensions can change considerations in decision-making procedures. Moreover, the takeaway about the effectiveness of unified regional governance with regional collaborations rather than fragmented perspectives is discussed. Cross-border cooperation under a regional direction has shown more efficiency in the last decade than city-scale isolated plans. The studies also show the potential rooms to implement alternative self-governing ideas and the main barriers to achieving justice in the right to housing in Great Geneva

ABSTRACT. In Brussels, a city of acute governance complexity and a plethora of diverse housing frameworks, a considerable amount of alternative housing initiatives deviating spatially, functionally or tenure wise has emerged in response to the ongoing housing crisis. Many of such initiatives are part of grassroots activist activities or have been set in motion by an official governmental configuration. However, a wide array of them is part of an in-between sphere, which situates and reaches out to both public, private & informal structures. Such initiatives occur through multiple synergies across the third-sector world and engage with a certain level of collective living. Existing literature has focused on either viewing them as a uniform block of housing projects or examining them through an individual-project perspective but rarely in relation to the wider landscape they have been generated from. This paper aims to shift the focus and argues that such initiatives constitute a highly entangled network with various interconnected practices scattered throughout the urban realm. Together, these practices make space for housing solutions for vulnerable groups, while denoting broader demands to the city’s urban realm. This contribution revolves around the creation of a series of map-makings in Brussels in a macro and micro level, using document-analysis and field-research data. By capturing the relational and spatial imprint of this multilayered network, they aspire to unravel and comparatively address the main clusters of housing strategies appearing within the network. As such, they try to capture how the broader network attempts to claim the right to housing in the region of Brussels, relying on their own expertise, interlocking with current official housing policies and/or building on activist housing movements' dynamics.

ABSTRACT. We are witnessing a transformation of shared housing in Sweden, in which coliving is the most recent, market driven development. Although the discourse, and the strong engagement by many of its residents, aim to support community built on the commoning practice of care – what is emerging is commodified and individualised forms of commoning. We use commoning practices to describe the contradictions in the aims and potentials of coliving as developed by operators, and, the daily life tensions experienced by residents. Based on interviews with fifteen operators and twelve residents, we offer the following analysis. First, while coliving on the one hand is marketed as a way to access a ‘community of friends’ ‘with interesting CVS’, on the other hand, the decrease of the size of shared spaces, the inclusion of cleaning services and the reduction of the options of self-managing coliving – significantly decrease the potential for commoning reproduction practices as a generator of relationships to evolve. Secondly, the sometimes cramped (or no) private space, combined with prompts from operators and community manager to share and develop the community, leads to a lack of, or pressure on residents’ privacy. Finally, we show how the operators as well as the colivers strive for a sense of community and value sharing with the other residents, while sharing is reduced to socializing with like-minded individuals and groups in leisurely activities. The reproductive tasks of daily life are commodified to services to be purchased. We end with some thoughts on the implications of housing innovations such as coliving on policy making; politicians and planners need to be careful about the expansion and regulations of these developments, as they risk creating a surge of precarious housing conditions for groups that already suffer a multitude of vulnerabilities.

ABSTRACT. Gentrification is a dynamic and multi-faceted process that has significant implications for population health. As an inequitable process of urban change, gentrification’s effects are heterogenous with some research finding racial differences in health outcomes as Black, but not white, residents experience adverse effects. Despite its implications for population health, many questions remain about how gentrification impacts resident health and why these impacts vary across racial subgroups. Applying a lens of racial capitalism, we understand that Black, low-income communities may be disproportionately vulnerable to gentrification and its adverse impacts including multiple forms of displacement that result from this process. Black, low-income residents may be residentially or physically displaced from gentrifying neighborhoods; they may also experience cultural and political displacement, in the form of appropriation and exclusion, in ways that influence health. Cultural and political displacement, which impacts residents able to stay in their changing neighborhoods, is largely understudied in public health research. Thus, the goals of this study are to: 1) examine how Black residents in New Haven, CT experience gentrification and processes of cultural and political displacement in ways that influence their health and well-being and 2) assess how an ongoing legacy of racial capitalism shapes these processes of displacement. Given the history of racialized urban policies and practices in the US, we believe that New Haven, dubbed the “Model City” during urban renewal, is an excellent case study for this project. We use concept mapping, a mixed methods technique, for data collection and analyses. Concept mapping is a participatory research approach that incorporates qualitative and quantitative methods to represent participant-generated concepts via two-dimensional maps. Preliminary analysis, thus far, highlights three thematic clusters that clarifies how gentrification-induced displacement influences Black resident health and well-being: high costs of goods and other services, pressure to change culture, and fragmentation of neighborhood cohesion.

ABSTRACT. The housing crisis in Portugal, assumed since the beginning of the last century, different phases along its course until the present day. Distinct configuration can be identified between what was the housing crisis of the 20th century and the one that gains expression in the 21rst century, as well as the responses to one and the other. It is also possible to establish a link between the two in what concerns to habitat configuration and construction. In order to approach the Portuguese expression of this crisis, it is important to contextualise, from a diachronic analysis, the concepts promoted and disseminated in the international framework, specifically, in the context of Europe and their echo in national regulations and practice. Reference documents such as UN-Habitat I and II (1976, 1996), the New Urban Agenda (UN-Habitat III, 2017) containing part of the Sustainable Development Goals (ODS, 2015) are analysed; but also documents such as the Davos Declaration (2018), the New Leipzig Charter (2020) or the New European Bauhaus (2021). In the national regulations, the Basic Housing Law (2019) and the New Generation of Housing Policies (2018) are analysed, as well as the design of the most significant public housing programs. In a cross-reading of international reference documents, their assumptions and goals, and the most significant programs or funding dedicated to the production of housing [and habitat?] in Portugal, it is possible to identify the dynamics, emerging challenges, new requirements and the scope of the necessary innovation in design and practice.

ABSTRACT. With the impact of climate change, the world is facing the trend of net-zero and the challenge of energy transformation, hoping to mitigate the impact of climate change through the development of renewable energy. In response to Taiwan's local environmental characteristics, one of the main forces of renewable energy development is the photovoltaic system, and the ground type is the most common, but the lack of systematic overall consideration of location of the photovoltaic system makes competition of development of renewable energy and environmental resources protection, resulting in the green conflict of photovoltaic development. Since Taiwan's land area is small, but development of photovoltaic system requires a large amount of land, and the use of land has multiple values, how to improve the efficiency of land use, and how to balance the values to achieve fairness is an important issue of how to coexist with the environment and society in the development of photovoltaic system. Therefore, this study aims to provide planning guidelines for photovoltaic land from the perspective of environmental symbiosis from the scale of the national territory, taking the counties and cities in Taiwan as an example, and considering the conditions and restrictions including environmental and social symbiosis. In addition to avoiding environmentally sensitive and ecological hotspot areas, the model was established by taking into account the characteristics and placing different restrictions according to the distance classification. After determining the weights of the attributes through the entropy weighting method, the spatial multi-criteria assessment is used to classify the photovoltaic systems according to their locational suitability. The results can reflect on target for photovoltaic facilities and provide a basis for locational allocation and supporting measures, so that the future planning of photovoltaic land can integrate growth management and realize the coexistence of environment under net-zero.

ABSTRACT. In order to preserve cities and regions as livable spaces in the face of climate change, climate adaptation is essential. The project Evolving Regions aims to support seven regions in North-Rhine Westphalia (NRW), Germany in their adaptation process and to empower actors to increase local resilience. Climate Impact Analysis (CIA), based on which particularly affected areas can be identified and tailor-made adaptation measures can be developed, plays a central role in this process. Moreover, the project focuses on the interactive preparation of the CIA results with the visualization software Tableau in order to make the results usable for planners in their daily work. Communicating knowledge with visualization tools has found little application in climate adaptation so far, although these tools have the potential to bridge the gap between science and practice (Weaver et al., 2013; Grainger et al., 2016). In contrast to static maps and GIS systems, interactive data visualizations (IDV) make the depth of CIA data usable for a wide range of stakeholders, allow results to be presented clearly and easily, and encourage engagement with the data through an interactive, game-like approach (Goudine, 2021). This leads to added value to local actors' planning practices and decision-making processes related to climate adaptation. The practicality of the IDV of the CIA is tested throughout the project in close cooperation with local actors. The methodological approach consists of: a) creation of the CIA through geographical analyses b) IDV of the analyses in Tableau c) conducting a survey on the practicality of the IDV d) conducting feedback formats with local actors e) revision of the CIA and IDV preparation based on the feedback and survey f) conducting a survey to record changes in practicality. The project thereby explores how IDV can support planners in enhancing resilience in the face of uncertainty.

ABSTRACT. Open data, big data, and information communication technologies have been utilized to seek to reinforce information transferability. Open data platforms have been implemented to compile and provide multiple datasets for different purposes of usages in the database, including during emergency situations such as floods. The information sharing of inundated areas during flood emergencies is essential to navigate the needs of and provide support to affected people and facilities. However, this implementation requires some adjustments for the organization authority and the design of the technology itself due to different purposes of technology intervention and the datasets included. This paper aims to address these different dataset combinations of open data platforms and to analyze the existing examples of dataset combination types that offer citizen engagement improvement. The study shows that open data platforms tend to provide dataset combinations rather than a single dataset type. Empirically, the more diverse the datasets in an open data platform, it offers more purpose of usage and has a different pattern of civic engagement. We use a qualitative approach with a combination of analysis methods. A matrix is created to analyze the different combinations of datasets and in-depth interviews of key actors were conducted to discover the deeper analysis of flood open data tools implementation empirically in the case studies. More specifically, this paper explores the case study of digital technology utilization in flood management locally (Jakarta – PetaJakarta.org ) and regionally (European Union – EFAS). This paper argues that these interventions result a shift in the organizational routines – not only in how they operate the bureaucratic procedure, but also how they structure the man powers during flood emergency response – which addresses a transformation of governmental infrastructure management. These open data governance designs will also determine to what extent the citizen engagement may improve.

ABSTRACT. Our research contributes to the debate on the role of universities and their campuses and the use of innovative methods of cooperation (living labs) in the process of urban socio-ecological transition. The presentation is an in-depth analysis of the main findings of the research carried out in years 2017-2022 at the Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland. We use the concept of learning landscape to study the new campus of the Jagiellonian University, which was built between 1998 and 2017. It is situated at the edge of the city between dense urban fabric and protected natural areas. All this makes this campus to be predestined to deal with important social, environmental and technological issues in a creative and innovative manner. However, as many of new university campuses in Poland, it represents an outdated model of isolated faculty buildings located next to each other with limited interdisciplinary contacts between them and underdeveloped relations with their neighbourhoods and other parts of the city. We have used the following research methods: desktop study of initiatives undertaken on campuses of leading universities worldwide, consultations and participatory workshops with various groups of campus users and online survey of students. The study was based on useful research approach (Mohrman & Lawler III, 2011). Therefore, findings from these studies were used in order to propose strategic actions to be undertaken at the campus so that it can become a leading area of the city for testing, implementing and scaling up solutions supporting sustainable urban transformations in the future. In particular, we designed a concept of a campus living lab. The aim of our presentation is to show the results of the completed study and the campus living lab concept, which will be implemented over the next 4 years.

ABSTRACT. Energy transitions are a central element for urban transitions and, at the same time, one that could only be realized through strong collaboration between urban and rural governance. Another specific element of the governance of energy transitions is that a joint enactment of urban and rural energy transitions depends on the engagement of civil society actors from both areas. Energy cooperatives are often discussed as a way of engendering this civil society engagement for urban and rural energy transitions. This study investigates the role of identity in fostering or hindering the scale-up of renewable energy supply and related activity by energy cooperatives. Most studies investigating the role of group identity per se focus on the benefits of group identities. Yet, this perspective tends to underestimate the negative effects of social identity for inclusive energy transitions. For example, energy cooperatives are, so far, often made-up of older men with higher education levels and a good income. This creates a particular group identity that is likely to attract people with similar characteristics - while at the same time making it less attractive to join for people with different characteristics. With this in mind, this study examines the case of a federation of energy cooperatives with more than 70 energy cooperatives in the North of Germany. In an inter- and transdisciplinary project, we analyze the different interests and identities of the energy cooperatives, the implications for inclusivity and exclusivity, and the consequences in terms of the propensity for different types of citizens to join particular energy cooperatives and, thus, its potential impact on sustainability transitions in general energy transitions in particular. Through the above, we aim to connect different process levels in our analysis and inferences, such as the effect of policy support in terms of lowering individual barriers for joining sustainability initiatives.

ABSTRACT. “Energy transition” is considered an effective response to global warming, and discussions regarding energy-efficient cities have gained attention within the urban planning community. The building energy consumption as well as the roof photovoltaic potential are highly influenced by the urban structure. In addition to passive building design, people started to explore the possible impact of structures on energy performance at an urban scale. Taiwan is an island with only 12% of its energy consumption produced domestically. Therefore, to accelerate its energy transition, the government planned to raise its solar energy capacity from 9 to 20GW by 2025 and set an ambitious goal of 40-80GW in the 2050 net zero emission strategy. Energy efficiency will be highly emphasized in the building sector. However, experts criticized the lack of concrete implementation of strategies and doubted if the goals are achievable. Very few studies have questioned whether the current urban planning process has enough consideration towards renewable energy in building energy-efficient cities. Therefore, this paper aims to evaluate the built urban environment parameters regarding building energy use and roof solar generation. The solar potential generation, total energy consumption, and energy sufficiency rate will be regarded as criteria for energy performance. Hence, the land readjustment area was selected as a case study extent in Tainan City, and by taking existing situations as the baseline, scenario analysis is further conducted through parameter adjustments. The field studies focus on urban parameters, namely site coverage, orientation, and open space. GIS, Rhinoceros 3D, and EnergyPlus were utilized in this research. It is expected to demonstrate the impact of urban structures on energy performance and discuss how an energy-efficient city could be planned. Finally, we expect to indicate the incompleteness of the current urban planning tools and propose new planning guidelines for facilitating energy-sufficient cities in the future.

ABSTRACT. From the 23rd March 2020 the UK was put into lockdown in an unprecedented attempt to fight the spread and impact of Covid-19. Our worlds shrank physically to our homes and their immediate neighbourhoods, yet the roles we needed to perform there expanded: working from home, looking after families, home schooling, staying in touch (remotely) with isolated relatives, shopping, exercising, etc.

In order to get a picture of how well or poorly the design of our home and neighbourhoods have been supporting us during the period of Coronavirus lockdown, a non-targeted survey containing a combination of 25 closed and open questions was launched in May 2020, initially via a series of professional and civil networks – the Place Alliance, Urban Design London, Good Homes Alliance, Civic Voice, Town & Country Planning Association, and the Urban Design Group – and latterly by word of mouth/social media.

A total of 2510 responses were collected - representing 7,200 people.

The majority felt: comfortable in their homes; satisfied with their neighbourhood; a bolstered sense of community during lockdown.

Unfortunately, this still left significant populations with a much poorer experience. If extrapolated across the UK, 11 million people were uncomfortable in their homes, 10 million felt no tangible change in community feeling, and 3 million suffered from poorly designed neighbourhoods that did not meet their basic everyday requirements.

Perhaps most worrying was the finding that the least comfortable dwellings, least supportive neighbourhoods and weakest sense of community correlated directly with the age of dwellings: the most recently built neighbourhoods (built between 2010 and 2020) recorded the lowest levels of satisfaction against all these factors.

Findings offer insights into how we should be designing or adapting them in the future so that they are more resilient and better able to support happy and healthy lifestyles.

ABSTRACT. Public transport has been a solid pillar of urban mobility. Even if it is statistically safe, existing low security perception, increased gender transgressions, limited reporting mechanisms and global challenges such as Covid-19 create reduced perceived safety and´distrust. Thus, citizens use less mass transport, traffic and emissions do not reduce, while the future urban environment is restrained from citizen feedback and co-development. We connect passengers in ad-hoc communities to create supportive spaces, enable passengers to report issues, create trust using rating mechanisms, and encourage behavior change through stimulating analytics. Cities and transport providers in return receive real-time insights regarding passenger perceptions and exploit new feedback channels. First results from the pilots in Istanbul and Dugopolje shall show evidence that bottom-up community-based innovation in existing critical urban mobility infrastructure can have an impact on how we move in our cities.

ABSTRACT. The presentation aims to explain why certain unlikely small towns show great resilience in the face of internal and external threats or crises. In this case, the focus is on smaller cities with a long-standing industrial and/or mining tradition in a peripheral location. Resilience has been shown to be common in older industrial areas, where resilience is often confused with resistance, where cities and regions can withstand shocks but also slowly lose their competitiveness (Sweeney et al. 2020).

In this presentation, we argue that resilience and resistance are two sides of the same coin. Through the case study of an economically successful small and peripheral industrial town, we will show how local resilience has emerged primarily through long-standing "soft" institutions that emerged in the mining and manufacturing era and depend on the small size of the town and the proximity between actors. These institutions create an environment in which local community actors can deal with external and internal shocks and sometimes even leverage them for socio-economic growth. However, the same institutional structure can also lead to parochialism and narrow-mindedness and dampens creativity.

The presentation highlights the neglected "small" and "industrial" urban communities and provides analytical generalisations about creating a resilient community within an existing institutional framework. It draws empirically on historical analysis of three critical junctures (sequence of major events triggered by internal and external forces) and explains how actors navigated through them to recover and renew. It also draws on 12 interviews with key local and national actors who were recognised as "leaders" during these critical junctures. Theoretically, it is based on evolutionary economic geography.

ABSTRACT. Containers mediate our lives. People use them for many purposes, such as transporting goods or waste and designing glamorous temporary structures like football stadiums or tourist resorts. In anthropology, however, containers are also symbols of liminality; they are sites for migrants and the homeless, for invisible and neglected objects and people. This paper explores how containers underscore the infinite liminality of our reality and reveal individual, political, and social dynamics in times of permanent crisis.

Based on ethnographic research in the Banija region of Croatia, the paper explores the perspectives of local people and their reflections on living in containers in the face of the aftermath of a powerful earthquake that struck them during the Covid-19 pandemic in December 2020. It presents the region’s double periphery status and long-lasting liminality, and puts a special focus on the people whose homes were destroyed first by the war in the 1990s and later by the earthquake. During the natural disaster, many people whose houses were in poor condition due to the war fled their unsafe homes and continue to live in 20-square-metre containers nearby. From their perspective, the containers were supposed to be a temporary solution, but instead they have become permanent dwellings, exacerbating the contradictions of the crisis and making normal life impossible.

In this paper, we present different perspectives of life in the containers, from the individuals and families who inhabit them to the positions of politicians at different levels, who blame each other for the situation or try to demonstrate their efficiency by providing additional containers. In this way, we try to present the “container life” as a relevant metaphor for today’s world, where the problems related to unwanted materials or problematic situations are solved by hiding them in containers and "throwing them away", so they disappear.

ABSTRACT. Numerous studies have discovered a relationship between high infection rate and low socio-economic background and ethnicity, pointing to economic and racial inequality. This study explores the inequality in government-imposed counter-COVID-19 measures rather than infection rates. Data was collected from Hong Kong, where small-scale lockdowns and test measures were imposed during the COVID-19 crisis. Areas as small as one single building or a small neighborhood were quarantined; residents were mandated to undergo testing and could not leave until their test results arrived. As opposed to an area-wide lockdown, this system reduced restrictions on human movement and lowered the cost of a whole-area lockdown. The choice of these sites depended on both infectious disease evidence by health experts as well as top-down bureaucratic decisions. It was found that districts with a higher proportion of populations speaking Chinese dialects as their main language, as well as minority ethnicities, were more prone to the lockdown-and-test measures. However, among test sites, populations speaking Chinese dialects were not related to higher discovered positive cases, and ethnic minorities correlated with lower positive cases. This means that the two minority groups bore more costs of lockdown but received the least efficient policy targeting. In the emergency of COVID-19, there were limited discussions on policy and site choice. This lack of transparency can lead to the over-targeting of minority groups, making government counter-COVID-19 measures inefficient and unequal; it also reduces state capabilities to counter crises. To improve public scrutiny and prevent disproportionate targeting of minorities, we suggest that there should be more transparency in the selection of sites and open access to data.

ABSTRACT. The project WALKMORE addresses a key aspect of planning and developing efficient and sustainable transport systems for the future: how to make people walk more. This is explored within the context of small cities, from both planning and a user perspective, through three main research activities. These include: 1) the planning processes shaping the built environment; 2) effects of built environments on walking behaviours and pedestrian perspectives and 3) pilots, using tactical urbanism approach to explore small scale changes to the built environments at the street scale and that may influence walking behaviours and the attractiveness of walking. How walkability manifests, is likely to strongly be related to context, geographical as well as scale, e.g. the size of a city. There exists an abundance of studies exploring the relationship between the built environment, walking behaviours and pedestrian experiences, However, because of the limited focus on the way the context matters, the evidence remains inconclusive. For example, in small Nordic cities, distances tend to be short, meaning that there is a high walking potential. Yet the private car dominates. To explore the effects of built environments on walking behaviours and pedestrian perspectives, a systematic investigation has been conducted of pedestrian experiences of the surroundings for walking in three small cities in Norway: Narvik, Steinkjer and Kongsvinger (10 -15.000 inhab). The data consists of survey results including map based PPGIS questions sent to inhabitants in the three cities, followed up by focus group interviews. In addition to exploring typical walkability indicators, we sum them up in categories, based on their nature and scale, to adequate more holistic approach. This method enabled us to map frequent walking routes and destinations in each city, pedestrians’ perception of specific places, as well as barriers for walking.

ABSTRACT. There are always debates on disaster protection standards and measures in high-density urban environments. When facing the challenge of climate uncertainty, strong infrastructure with high-protection standards may not be able to pass the test of extreme weather. Rigid construction such as flood prevention may block urban connections. Therefore, more and more adaptive measures are involved in the planning process. Among these, green infrastructure (GI) such as parks and green spaces or rain gardens are more acceptable to the public and decision-makers. However, GI needs to work with other infrastructure as disaster prevention measures, especially in a high-density urban environment. Moreover, land prices around GI have increased because of the comfortable and aesthetic feeling that GI provides as the co-benefit, attracting more development near sensitive areas, and this may increase the risk. This is the levee effect stated in the literature. Do people living in the urban environment recognize the value of GI in disaster risk reduction? Since risk perception and communication are critical factors in risk management, people’s perception toward the role of GI may influence the planning strategies and design details. On the other hand, economically disadvantaged communities are often located at the end of infrastructure systems or in areas not covered by them. When disasters come, their risk is even higher. This research analyzes the spatial relationship among GI distribution, disaster risk, and public climate perceptions in the city of Kaohsiung, Taiwan. We conducted 450 surveys in and around various types of GIs to examine climate awareness and attitudes toward urban resilience based on the role of GI. We analyze social-economic factors, such as population density, land prices, infrastructure coverage through spatial statistics. The role of urban GI has multiple functions. Climate fairness and justice should be considered during the planning process through comprehensive spatial analysis.

ABSTRACT. Main argument One of the main contemporary critical issues is the exposure of the population to high levels of vulnerability and risk, linked, for example, to atmospheric pollutants that cause both short-term and long-term adverse effects, with substantial repercussions on the wellbeing of citizens, the public sphere, in particular health, and the quality of urban living. Many studies have documented the extent to which vegetation can significantly reduce pollution levels: the benefits provided by the different types of urban green formations in terms of ecosystem services (MEA 2005) of support, regulation and cultural make green space a crucial area among the different configurations that space (especially public space) takes on in the city: it is here that the improvement of community health and wellbeing, settlement quality, social inclusion and mitigation of climate change impacts are all at stake (Daily 1997).

Scope(s) of the contribution To demonstrate how, in this perspective, at the urban scale, the urban planning project must direct choices towards objectives of complex regeneration (ecological-environmental, social and economic) of the city aimed at optimal use of resources. Among the design themes for the new resilient, adaptive and antifragile city, the concept of green urban infrastructure presents fertile interpretative potential insofar as it is recognised as having a role of primary importance in the policies of conservation, environmental protection and enhancement, sustainable development, mitigation and adaptation in the urban context (Ahern 2007).

Methodological/ conceptual approaches, The concept of green infrastructure triangulates different fields of public action. It assumes in parallel the functions of the reservoir of production of ecosystem services, dynamic system of adaptation to climate change phenomena, a factor of reorganisation of urban metabolism and frame of the new public city (Gasparrini 2018). We present the Turin 2021 Green Infrastructure Strategic Plan.

ABSTRACT. In this paper, I take a look at the socio-economic development in two towns in northern Iceland; Siglufjörður and Ólafsfjörður who fishing towns who were amalgamated in 2006 in connection with the opening of a 11 km long road tunnel between them, shortening the driving distance between them by 180 km on a whole year basis. We will look at how these two communities, which faced great changes when they were amalgamated as the municipality of Fjallabyggð in 2006, took different economic development trajectories. We will explore how the people of the two fishing towns managed to adapt to major changes initiated by the state authorities and later by private initiative through large investments in tourism and biotechnology – all changes that can be said to have occurred in the context of this new tunnel opening in 2010. The key question is: Has the community created by the two towns demonstrated resilience in transforming from traditional Icelandic fishing towns into a community that is more characterised by tourism and the knowledge industry? Resilience is defined as “the capacity to cope with change and continue to develop” A further definition talks about resilience as the ability of a local or regional community to recover from natural disasters, or to anticipate global trends that may present challenges to local industries, jobs and communities. These risks may include the automation and decarbonisation of the energy sector or, from a local perspective, trends such as an ageing population or demographic decline. Some of these circumstances existed in Siglufjörður and Ólafsfjörður prior to 2000. In the study the focus is on how these communities managed to adapt to the changes they went through with the decline of traditional fisheries and growth of tourism and innovation in biotechnology.

ABSTRACT. Forestami is a project started in 2018 with a research by the Polytechnic of Milan. The main goal is to plant 3million trees within the Metropolitan area of Milan. This project is under implementation thanks to the agreement signed by Metropolitan City of Milan, the Municipality of Milan, Parco Nord of Milan, South Milan Agricultural Park, ERSAF - Lombardy Region, and the Milan Community Foundation.

The Metropolitan Area of Milan is a densely urbanized area, placed in one of the most densely populated regions in Europe, with high levels of soil sealing, air pollution.

The great challenge of the project is to trigger a change in our cities (physical, environmental and cultural), reconsidering nature as a structural part of the urban space and landscape by planting new trees by 2030. To trigger this change, it is necessary to define the priorities, the potential and the actual availability of land, to plant the trees.

The paper describes the process of engaging the municipalities within Milan's metropolitan area to build land availability.

Of the 133 municipalities, the research engaged 62 municipalities with a signed MoU to participate the project. This MoU defines the political, technical willingness, plus the strategy to implement green systems. Moreover, the research builds a live database in which, thanks to the continuous work with the different administrations, we stock the available lands to plant trees. Since the start of the project, 41 sites of intervention have been implemented directly by Forestami funds, equal to 50000 new trees and shrubs. Overall, the joint effort bith public and private, accounts for 427.475 plants since the start of the project.

To conclude, as a change of strategy is needed, it is necessary to understand, study and test which are the physical spaces to be transformed and the policies to be implemented.

ABSTRACT. Post-growth concepts, frameworks, and narratives are beginning to catch the attention of policymakers across the globe. Our review of the academic and policy literature finds that this rising interest in post-growth is especially concentrated in Europe, where some cities are engaging with what these ideas might mean on the ground. From Amsterdam to Barcelona, Glasgow to Copenhagen, European city governments and residents are seeking ways to realign their priorities away from GDP growth and towards the pursuit of social and ecological wellbeing. Concepts and agendas like ‘doughnut economics’, ‘community wealth building’ and ‘circular economy’ are being introduced to urban strategies and attempts to put them into practice are underway. This paper explores how post-growth ideas are being translated into innovative policies and radical political projects to contest the economic status quo at the city level. Interviews with politicians, policymakers and activists in six European case-study cities inform our analysis of the challenges of implementing post-growth, and how these are being navigated by political coalitions working across scales. Our findings are drawn together, finally, into a set of health warnings and recommendations for advocates of post-growth in European cities.

ABSTRACT. The presentation discusses the emerging results of an ongoing research project on the governance of climate adaptation in metropolitan areas, with a particular focus on its implications in terms of territorial equity. Urban areas are increasingly vulnerable to climate risks such as urban heat island effect, flooding, and extreme weather events. In response, cities around the world are engaging in climate adaptation, which is becoming one of most relevant urban governance challenges of our time. Most adaptation initiatives have been carried out by municipalities, which however face a series of barriers to adaptation, connected to issues such as a lack of resources and capabilities (especially challenging for smaller municipalities), as well as the transboundary nature of climate phenomena and the need to mobilize competences which are distributed across government levels.

Subnational actors, such as metropolitan institutions, are increasingly involved in and responsible for adaptation policymaking, for instance producing adaptation strategies or plans. Metropolitan institutions have also been suggested to have the coordinating capacity to promote climate adaptation across entire metropolitan regions. However, the presence of political fragmentation and administrative boundaries, as well as the persistence of inter- and intra-municipal divergences and inequalities within metropolitan contexts, still often represent a barrier to effective and inclusive adaptation across metro regions.

Based on an in-depth analysis of three case studies (Milan, Stockholm, and Amsterdam), selected as forerunner cities of adaptation policymaking at the metropolitan scale, this research aims to critically assess how adaptation is currently being advanced across metropolitan areas in Europe. Particular attention is given to the issue of if and how metropolitan-scale adaptation can be compatible and consistent with the promotion of greater territorial equity, by looking at innovations in governance arrangements and practices and at the political behavior of actors, concentrating especially on the perspectives of smaller, peripheral municipalities.

ABSTRACT. The European Green Deal comprises of two aspects, climate neutrality and resilience. With respect to the local level, their synergies and tradeoffs demand attention to the integration of policy, modelling and data into urban planning. This paper probes into this issue theorising the concept of land function —the capacity of land to provide goods or services— as distinct from those of land use —the purpose for which land is exploited— and land cover —the physical surface of land— to delineate the integration of climate neutrality and resilience functions into the new technical requirements of Urban Local Plans at the level of municipal unit in Greece, which are funded by the Recovery and Resiliency Facility and scheduled for completion by 2026. Focusing on climate change mitigation, adaptation and development, this research draws on planning theory and land system science and applies to the study and preparation of urban plans.

ABSTRACT. EU missions synthesize the measures and strategies set by the new EU 2021-2027 program to strengthen the efforts to deal with the climate challenges with ambitious goals in a very challenging deadline, 2030. Missions are thought to deliver impacts by putting research and innovation into a new role combined with new forms of governance and collaboration in European cities and stress the role of citizens and their engagement towards the so-called “climate transition”. Within the framework of the sustainability transition concept (Köhler et al. 2007; Frantzeskaki and Rok, 2018) and the transition theory (Geels and Shot, 2007; Kemp et al. 2007), we discuss climate strategies integrated into planning instruments that cities are developing and implementing to improve the local ecosystems to cope with the climate crisis by addressing EU mission. Urban planning plays a critical role in enabling Europe to achieve Climate neutrality by supplying a systemic vision of urban systems and carbon storage/sequestration dynamics. In addition, we introduce the vision, the concept and the early achievements of the CLIMABOROUGH project funded by the Horizon Europe Mission Climate Neutral and Smart Cities. The project aims to strengthen traditional urban and spatial planning approaches through data and knowledge-based decision-making while leveraging the role of climate services as transversal evaluation tools to validate the effectiveness of initiatives, projects, transformations and interventions towards climate neutrality. We discuss how experimenting with innovative procurement in CLIMABOROUGH can contribute to sustainability transition as well as to a renovated approach to urban planning. We’ll do this in the view of integrating policy instruments and measures, normative tools and land-use regulations within a comprehensive framework of urban planning for climate neutrality (Alibasic, 2018; Nevens and Roorda, 2014; de Groot et al. 2010).

ABSTRACT. In response to global climate change and the huge demand for energy-consuming industries, renewable energy has become gradually important. The Taiwanese government proposed “Taiwan’s Pathway to Net-Zero Emissions in 2050” in March 2022. It declares the necessity of energy transitions to cope with the net-zero target but there is no obvious scientific base behind it yet. Meanwhile, after more than 20 years of effort, solar photovoltaic technology has relatively matured and is widely accepted by society in Taiwan. Thus, the government decided to dive in and promote photovoltaic panels and sets an ambitious solar energy target of 40 GW by 2050 under the pressure of the nuclear-free goal in 2025. The high ratio of land in Taiwan is ecologically or hazard sensitive. Additionally, high population density and land scarcity are intrinsic constraints. Therefore, after promoting large-scale photovoltaic power stations for over a half decade, we ran into a serious siting challenge which result in significant concerns of green conflict. As the potential of agrophotovoltaic has gained attention in Europe and Japan, it is expected to ease some pressure from frustration at seeking large-scale photovoltaic power station sites. Hence, this paper takes Tainan City, an important agricultural city in Taiwan, as an example to explore the potential of agrophotovoltaic development. This paper will establish a siting structure that rules out unsuitable areas by eco-sensitive factors, land-use limitations, and technical limitations. By attempting to identify appropriate areas and setting up scenarios, we will demonstrate the amount and location of agricultural land with a high potential for agrophotovoltaic development in Tainan City. The research result aims to provide an evidence-based framework for exploring the possibility of co-production between agriculture and renewable energy to ease the gradually increasing green conflicts in Taiwan.

ABSTRACT. The resilience of the local food system is being underlined as one of the most important strategic goals for a sustainable future. However, since the question of what constitutes the local scale of food production depends largely on the type of product and supply chain, the associated foodshed can range from a site scale, city and city region up to wider region and country level. As a proof of concept whether functional urban areas (FUAs) can serve as references for local food systems, we provide evidence on their capacity to provide vegetarian diet supply to their residents. Applying the Metropolitan Foodshed and Self-Sufficiency Scenario (MFSS) model methodology we estimate the level of potential food self-sufficiency of the FUAs. We quantitatively compare the results for FUAs with the results of local planning documents of metropolitan areas. The approach is applied to 9 city regions representing different European countries: Wrocław (PL), Ostend (BE), Berlin (DE), Avignon (FR), Copenhagen (DK), Bari (IT), Brasov (RO), Athens (EL), Barcelona (ES). The results show that vegetarian and local food demand could be satisfied in first five FUAs of these city regions. However, if the same number of calories as current diet delivers is to be maintained only the first three FUAs have enough agricultural land to supply vegetarian ingredients to this diet. The results for metropolitan comparison return the same three cities plus Bari. We discuss the role of urban consumers’ dietary choices in regional food self-sufficiency and role of the city administration in supporting building the resilience using urban food strategies. We share what European can cities learn from one another to help them better confront these challenges.

ABSTRACT. Social innovation has become a keyword not only in urban practices but also in urban policy-making agendas at various scales (Bragaglia, 2021). The European Union is central in spreading the social innovation paradigm among its Member States (Sabato et al. 2017). In this sense, one of the most recent and relevant EU initiatives is the Urban Innovative Actions (UIA). Despite the major impact that UIA is having in disseminating innovations and, more specifically, social innovations, the academic debate still needs to investigate this topic. Consequently, the paper intends to shed light on this specific initiative for its explicit focus on the urban dimension by investigating how it fits into the social innovation discourse promoted by the European Union. This is particularly relevant since the public and academic debate is increasingly questioning the potentialities of hybrid governance models as well as the possible janus-faced effects of social innovation (Swyngedouw, 2005) as a political strategy promoted ‘from above’. The paper is the result of an in-depth analysis of UIA policy documents and projects selected by the EU throughout Europe, but also of the authors’ direct experience within one specific UIA project financed in the framework of UIA IV Call on the topic of Urban Security.

ABSTRACT. This paper explores contradictions in democratic governance approaches to climate protests in cities. We argue that limits to democratic governance is an underappreciated problem in the literature on urban sustainability transformations. The past few years have seen a growing political backlash against core dimensions of more ambitious climate policies in Scandinavian cities and elsewhere in Europe – both from actors that seek to roll back climate-related measures and actors that seek to strengthen them. Empirically, the article examines how city leadership and governance structures in four Scandinavian cities (Oslo, Bergen, Stockholm and Gothenburg) respond to the conflicting demands of these protests. Based on interviews and fieldwork in the case cities, we examine the claims and strategies of the protest groups, as well as the experiences, approaches and governance solutions political and administrative leaders as they seek to overcome the conflicts and contradictions of equity, citizen demands and emission reductions.

We find that city leaders in the case cities are well aware of the complexity of the challenges, and have developed some managerial and procedural approaches for dealing with them. Nevertheless, they struggle to cope with and accommodate the underlying socio-spatial conflicts that maintain the more fundamental contradictions of just climate transformations. There are clear limits to how current governance models manage to integrate challenges to the legitimacy of the climate policy agenda. Exploring the ways both pro- and counterprotests mobilize and seek influence, we find differences in how different groups manoeuvre governance processes and achieve influence. Those protest actions that succeed in influencing the authorities rely on a particular social-cultural competence and networks, as well as competence in maneuvering local bureaucratic processes. In our case studies, it is pro-climate groups that tend to maneuver these processes most successfully, while counterprotests are less successful.

ABSTRACT. This paper addresses comparative empirical research on the intersections between urban-centred embodied social and climate justice activism and climate governance in urban Europe in the face of bewildering climate futures. The presentation focuses on tapping into the embodied-experiential dimensions that shaped the participatory processes of both the organization of the first citizens’ assemblies for climate in United Kingdom, France, and Spain between 2018 and 2023, and the articulation of the citizens' proposals. The paper contributes to the field of urban governance studies with evidence-based data from embodied inquiries into social and climate justice, urban-centred ethnography, and depth relational interviews using literature from somatic arts and somatic psychology studies. The study has the aim to reclaim the possibility of citizens’ in-person participatory and deliberative forms of engagement in climate governance, rather than only online, as many opportunities of testing and implementing democratic innovations through embodied empathy and intercorporeality (affects, nonverbal communication, pre-reflective mutual understanding, etc.) could have been missed and possibly hindered the democratic quality of the facilitation process. Particularly, important embodied social and climate justice issues could have been overlooked in the overall organizational process of such a participatory deliberative democratic tool. In brief, this paper is intended to outline new forms of citizens’ engagement by disclosing key implicit and explicit resilient embodied-relational dynamics within the recent social and climate justice initiatives, practices and communities implicated in pursuing sustainable development goals. It aims to contribute to a broader understanding of the participatory framework of climate citizens’ assemblies, by disentangling the prefigurative, performative and institutional processes that eventually formed the mentioned climate citizens’ assemblies, and their applications and implications in the organizational dynamics, outcomes and possibilities of past, present, and future Citizens' Assemblies for Climate in the cities of Europe.

ABSTRACT. Invited forms of citizens' involvement that include coproduction have been more and more often used by local administrations as a new way of urban governance to shape the transition of contemporary cities towards sustainability. Nevertheless, studies and debates have highlighted several inconsistencies concerning these kinds of approaches to urban governance and their related forms of collective action. Although these processes appear as providing solutions to crucial socio-ecological problems, they arouse several doubts about their efficacy in improving sustainability and promoting democracy. Following these criticisms, in this paper, I argue that these practices risk “desertifying” local contexts and communities. The paper shows how recognize tangible and intangible "desertifying" impacts of invited participatory processes and related governance processes that go well beyond democracy issues. The first part of the paper offers a survey of the debate concerning emerging and traditional forms of collective action, with the aim of highlighting the most relevant changes and critical issues. In the second part, by drawing on Deleuzian theories I outline an interpretative framework to explore the tangible and intangible sides of invited practices. Through the analysis of some cases of study, the paper continues by illustrating a few of the most relevant and negative intangible effects of these practices. Channelling people's discomfort into a stream of predefined actions invited collective action risks weakening local communities and public administrations' transformative capacity and resilience to new and old socio-environmental vulnerabilities and injustices. The absence of a democratic dialectic characterizing invited processes hampers the idea of the city as a collective good thus weakening existing possibilities for an equitable and sustainable transformation of space. The paper concludes by asking a few questions which could help to think about how to improve participatory urban governance.

ABSTRACT. This contribution analyses two cases from Sweden, the mining city of Kiruna and the port city of Luleå, as examples of how the green transition, including the implementation of the European Green Deal (2020), becomes a new challenge for the sustainable urban development based on the local participation and respect for local traditions and citizens needs in the remote, European sub-Arctic cities.

The green transition is already shaping urban spaces and socio-economic conditions through growing demands for more sustainable resources and energy supplies: in Kiruna through the case of iron ore and very recently discovered rare materials and in Luleå through intensive development of new technologies industry.

Our findings suggest that the role of citizens in the local dialogue dedicated to sustainable urban development in both cities is limited or even ignored. This observation not only opens questions about the causes of such situations but also encourages discussion about the true meaning and importance of local civil dialogue in the northern European areas (perceived more and more often as promising European renewable resources fields) in the face of sustainable development imperatives and the economic interests of business.

In this paper, based on desk research and (virtual) fieldwork, we aim to map clashing perspectives and narratives of the main actors involved in the green transition and the sustainable urban development in these cities to advance the understanding of the role of citizens in achieving sustainable development goals in sub-arctic peripheral towns.

ABSTRACT. In the 2010s, the second largest cities in Norway and Sweden, Bergen and Gothenburg, saw similar local political phenomenon: an initiative protesting against green policies in the local/regional transport sector became a popular social movement. Within a year it was transformed into a new political party (‘new’ at least in the local context) with an outstanding electoral success locally. In Gothenburg, the initiative was named Stop the West Link (“Stoppa Västlänken”) and resulted in the creation of The Democrats who got 16.95 % of the votes for the City Council. In Bergen, the Facebook-group No to more Road Tolls developed into a local branch of a new national political party, FNB. It obtained 16,7 per cent of the votes for the City Council. However, in the subsequent elections, FNB was completely decimated. The Democrats in Gothenburg lost more than half of its voters in the local elections in 2022.

Hence the paper addresses the following question: what caused the sudden rise and fall of the new protest movements-cum-parties in Bergen and Gothenburg?

The empirical analysis is structured around the following themes: (i) the grievances of the protesters and framings of justice, (ii) the mobilization methods used by the movement leaders, (iii) political opportunity structures and (iv) local governance factors that incentivized a quick and ‘premature’ transformation of a local protest movement into a new political party; and finally (v) conflicts surrounding the emerging ‘green’ transformations of cities. Three theoretical perspectives will be used: social-political cleavages, contentious politics and democratic (collaborative-participatory) governance.

ABSTRACT. As a political concept, just transition impacts the economy, the society, and the environment in regions. It assumes that we need to combine energy transition with social transition and truly leave no one behind. The variety of challenges observed in the coal-mine regions of Upper Silesia, Poland makes it even more legitimate to involve multiple stakeholders into the process of just transition governance. With the submission, we argue that a great number of stakeholders has been involved in the process of building up the fundamentals of just transition in the regions of Upper Silesia leading to the participatory approach. However, we see some of the groups not well represented or marginalized. Thus, the question is whether the region should seek for commitment building while implementing the policy or rather first aim at consensus building with the catch-up of those left behind to keep the process just? Also, there is a question of institutional set-up and if it makes possible for all the stakeholders to jump into the process and - future-looking - to what extent the implementation of the just transition plan can include the marginalized communities. The interviews we made with some of the communities that we identified as marginalized, allow us to offer the discussion on possible ways on how to mobilize them to enjoy being not left behind as well as on their potential to be engaged in the governance processes. The research builds on the direct involvement into the process of setting up the Just Transition Plan for Upper Silesia, expert support provided for the National Just Transition Plan and two running Horizon 2020 projects (BOLSTER and DUST).

ABSTRACT. In the mid-1950s, the Italian government launched an ambitious top-down industrialization program for the depressed and underdeveloped southern regions in order to narrow the socioeconomic gap with the wealthier northern regions. Set within the broader framework of the Marshall Plan of postwar reconstruction, as well as explicitly inspired by Perroux's (1950) theory of development poles, the Industrial Development Areas strategy included the industrialization of selected coastal areas in southern Italy, including the province of Siracusa in southeastern Sicily. The Siracusa hub produced a significant impact in terms of socioeconomic transformation. It became one of the largest petrochemical hubs in Europe and, until the 1970s, processed about 60 percent of all crude oil nationwide. The oil crisis, the gradual decline in employment rates and the emergence of a new awareness of environmental and public health impacts have greatly diminished confidence in this development model. In recent decades, a post-industrial rhetoric has reshaped institutional discourses regarding development models in the city of Siracusa, using a set of narratives and strategies inspired by a transition driven by tourism, green and smart growth. The paper focuses on the relationship between industrialization and new forms of post-industrial development in Siracusa where an uncomfortable industrial past was removed so as to represent the city as moving towards a new phase of capitalist development and rebrand it as an international tourist destination. In particular, the paper aims at scrutinizing the transition to supposedly new greener forms of urban development showing that tourism, narrated and promoted as a sustainable and eco-compatible alternative to industrialization, can in fact produce highly negative impacts on the local environment and communities.

ABSTRACT. Self-constructed cities refer to impoverished neighborhoods that suffer from inadequate housing. Such cities are the result of individual or communal initiatives who must self-construct their neighborhoods. Most of the self-constructed cities are located near endangered bioregions on the Earth, and their continued growth will inevitably aggravate the human impact on our planet. These areas' dwellers tackle threats such as poverty, environmental degradation, and disaster vulnerability. The lack of knowledge in planning self-constructed cities causes conditions of injustice. However, appropriate management of the existing natural capital of the surrounding areas of such cities can address the mentioned challenges and the conditions for justice. This paper aims to evaluate the role of Nature-based Solutions(NBS) in planning procedures, to create conditions of fairness and equity in Self-constructed cities. The paper focused on the linkage between the application of NBS and four principles of justice: Distributive justice, Restorative justice, Spatial justice and Interactional justice. The result of such implication is demonstrated in the academic case study of San José de Chamanga, Ecuador.

ABSTRACT. A just transition to a green, political economy and society depends on government and governance delivering procedural justice regarding fair resolution of disputes and equal allocation of resources in climate and sustainability politics (economic equality and equality of opportunities).

We use empirical evidence from key informant interviews of a purposely selected set of climate-related social movements and activist groups in four Scandinavian cities that on different accounts protest on prevailing climate policies (pro- and counter to existing policies), to develop a government effectiveness-trust thesis as a central premise for understanding if trust emerges and successful resolution of conflicts and just sustainability transition evolves (Oslo, Bergen, Stockholm, Gothenburg).

Our research confirms that civil society in Scandinavia cities is a type of agent that plays an important role in climate politics by influencing public opinion and it holds a unique position by playing a mediating role between government and citizens, albeit with varying degree of success due to a variety of institutional and governance factors.

We outline the strategies of a selected group of NGOs and climate activists group use in the framing of diverse climate-related issues (in green mobility and compact city development) and in mobilising engagement across a variety of climate aspects and social justice concerns and how they are met by local government in various political channels of interaction (political, bureaucratic, civic, social media). We suggest that albeit encounters are often instrumental, as a means to an end, or conflictual, there are also signs of new innovative collaborative arenas and platforms emerging, much in similar ways as how civil society-state encounters play out at national level in Scandinavia, that may enhance government effectiveness, social trust and social equality in the pursuit of climate and sustainability policies.

ABSTRACT. Urban freight transport is central to urban societies, and yet public authorities have traditionally left it to private actors to resolve urban freight challenges. Freight governance is fragmented, with ad hoc stakeholder involvement and unclear division of labour within the public sector. This paper examines emerging forms of collaboration between private stakeholders and public authorities and asks: what roles do public authorities gain through increased collaboration with freight stakeholders? Private stakeholders and their perspectives are entering formal arenas as freight transport becomes a ‘matter of concern’ for public authorities. It is nonetheless unclear what governance model is most suited for urban freight or what policy tools are available to urban authorities. We argue that increased stakeholder involvement implies a role-shift for the public sector, from an accommodator of freight solutions towards a more active role as a coordinator in urban freight governance. The governance of urban freight is therefore experiencing a shift from a form of network governance towards more collaborative governance. Empirically, the article examines Norwegian cities, which have been involved in national research and policy experimentation projects, as well as formed part of European policy networks to experiment new solutions with logistics stakeholders. Early findings show the development of different forms of stakeholder involvement according to context, with an overall increase in municipal involvement in these processes. Through a collaborative workshop, expert interviews, and document analysis, this study describes how urban authorities in Norway address local freight transport challenges through stakeholder involvement. It analyses the roles taken by urban authorities in three of Norway’s four largest cities – Bergen, Stavanger, and Trondheim – in their different forms of freight stakeholder involvement. Cities are attempting to address conflicts created by competing claims for public space, and this paper considers the roles that they are taking when addressing these conflicts.

ABSTRACT. Inspired by McAuliffe and Rogers’ (2019) article on values and agonistic pluralism, this paper explores the values, strategies and practices of local associations engaging in the politics of densification in Scandinavian cities. Although the compact city discourse continues to shape urban development, we see numerous local conflicts around densification projects. Local struggles make visible how urban planning informed by compact development objectives manifest locally and ‘generates small and big political resistances by enacting countless dividing lines in the city’ (Nicholls and Uitemark 2017:512). Exploring values underpinning different subject-positions involved in political resistances are important not just to understand how but why ‘contestations matter to people’(McAuliffe & Rogers:305). The role of values underpinning local contestations are not sufficiently acknowledged when cities pursue densification as part of their climate urban policies. The communities under study differ in social and spatial terms, yet local associations share concerns that densification will negatively impact on existing social, cultural and ecological values (e.g. social cohesion, socio-material qualities, green spaces), and a sense of not being heard. Thus, while embedded in place-specific values, local contestations reflect city-wide divides over what a good city is and could be (ibid). However, local actors’ strategies vary, reflecting differences in human, institutional and discursive capacities. While all have engaged with formal processes, their strategies vary along a continuum from ‘antagonistic’ obstruction to ‘agonistic’ critical engagements. These differences inform their legitimacy as seen from other governance actors, and subsequently their power to influence processes beyond obstructing a project through antagonistic practices. Important dimensions in the transition towards ‘the agonism, which Mouffe suggests is necessary for a more inclusive urban politics’ (ibid:512) is not only the actors’ acknowledgement of the values of ‘others’ as adversaries, but the discursive and institutional capacities to draw upon and engage plural values strategically in mobilisation and action.

ABSTRACT. This paper explores inequalities across Croatian cities from multiple perspectives. There are numerous methodological options for measuring dimensions of a city as an urban self-government unit. Croatian cities exhibit significant differences in terms of size, administrative, human, demographic, economic and fiscal capacity, the level of economic development and many others. Our analysis provides new perspectives on differences among Croatian cities. It also highlights disparities between cities measured by numerous indicators describing provision of local public services that are grouped according to the type of public function – general public services, public order and safety, economic affairs, environmental protection, housing and community amenities, health, recreation, culture and religion, education and social protection. Results of the cluster analysis classified Croatian cities into several groups and support policy decision makers by focusing on bridging urban divides and designing more inclusive cities.

The key research questions of the paper are the following:

(i) Whether cities can be grouped according to similar characteristics based on different indicators? (ii) What are the limitations and opportunities of current disparities among cities to provide local public services? (iii) What public policies should be taken to reduce disparities between cities aiming to increase inclusiveness at city level?

The last section summarizes our analysis and offers recommendations and framework, for improvements in the future administrative and territorial organization in Croatia. It also contains several policy implications for decision-makers in local self-government.

ABSTRACT. Urban development affects the changes taking place in contemporary open public spaces. These changes are reflected in the ways of using these spaces and interactions between people and the space of their activity. Research exploring the ways of human functioning in urban public spaces is fundamental during crisis states, such as the COVID-19 pandemic. Conclusions from this type of research can translate into modification, development, and evaluation of the value of theories and concepts. They can also influence urban policies and practices, contributing to more accurate design of urban spaces. Thanks to this, these spaces are becoming more and more socially attractive, they can better respond to the current needs of users and ensure the inclusion of many social groups. The result of this type of research may also be the shaping of more resilient spaces referring to considerations in the geography of uncertainty.

The purpose of the speech is to present the results of research conducted in 2021 among users of Plac Wolności in Poznan, Poland. During the research, two methods were used: observation and individual in-depth interviews. The research focused on the search for how a person strives to carry out the activity and satisfy needs in urban public space, how he relates to the space of his activities, and what values he attributes to it. Three tactics of spatial behavior were identified. They mark the course of human activity and determine the place of their occurrence, duration, and intensity. The implementation of each of the tactics translates into a different use of space and gives value to its elements. During the presentation, the obtained results will be related to the "15-minute city" and "compact city" concepts. Opportunities for the development of these concepts will also be discussed.

ABSTRACT. We investigate the implications of where those displaced by short-term rentals go for the social capital, sustainability and functioning of their former communities using population of cities and municipalities in Croatia, one of most tourism dependent world economies known for excessively high share of short-term rentals. In high tourism intensity places, short-term rentals create closed migration circuits between adjacent cities and municipalities of same counties, thus limiting exchange of ideas, knowledge and talent between socially and geographically different contexts. In less tourism-intensive areas, especially in already declining, ageing communities, short-term rentals displace residents on a larger geographical scale to other counites and countries, depriving local communities of their social capital. Short-term rentals act more as an accelerator than an initiator of the decline.

ABSTRACT. In recent decades, there has been increasing pressure to promote institutional transparency and publication of information and data of potential public interest. The general theoretical argument behind this assumes that transparency makes institutions more effective, promotes economic growth, and encourages citizen participation in public affairs. The link between transparency policies and the gender perspective fits within the incorporation of gender perspectives in the action of public authorities (McBride and Mazur, 2010) and in a progressive expansion of their scope from the construction of concepts that can be widely accepted and introduced, such as the idea of “mainstreaming” (Haussman and Sauer, 2007; Outshoorn and Kantola, 2007). At the same time, the introduction of the gender perspective in data generation can improve opportunities for women (Collado, 2016). However, current legislation does not include the obligation to disaggregate data by gender. Thus, Benítez-Eyzaguirre (2019) questions whether current transparency policies generate useful information for women, as the production and nature of public data may have been developed following non-egalitarian pattern. Indeed, who is the target of the information, for which objectives and which are the values and principals of this information are key questions that have not been addressed by regulation. Whether or not to include a gender vision in their websites is up to the institutions. This paper intends to analyse the situation of the gender perspective in public information offered on the websites of the municipalities of Catalonia and to analyse the impact of the institutional setting. Firstly, the information provided in the municipal websites is systematically identified and analysed in order to assess the situation. Secondly, we aim at identifying factors that may explain better performance in this subject, including elements related to citizenship –income, age structure, turnout– and institutional structure – political composition, form of government, staff and budget.

ABSTRACT. A growing number of FOI laws have been passed around the world, but their full enactment remains a challenge. Most of the research on determinants of active transparency focuses on sociodemographic, financial, elected officials, and the mayor’s characteristics as proxies to explain divergences in active transparency publication between municipalities. The results, however, are mostly ambiguous and small. To overcome these shortcomings, we propose delving into organizational factors as explanans of active transparency compliance. While usually overlooked in active transparency research, we contend that organizational factors may help gain a further understanding of active transparency compliance patterns. Drawing on institutionalist literature, we believe that organizational structures create feedbacks that affect active transparency law compliance. To show our point, our fieldwork involved the monitoring and extraction of Spanish local councils’ active transparency compliance patterns and the delivery of a questionnaire to the transparency officers of the same local councils. We have used the data obtained to elaborate a catalog of organizational factors and to gauge empirically which organizational factors affect active transparency compliance the most. Our contributions are twofold: first, we show that organizational factors are a key element in active transparency compliance. Second, we point towards considering, ceteris paribus, administrative factors over resource factors to explain divergences in active transparency law compliance.

ABSTRACT. This paper presents the results of an online citizen science project aimed at identifying critical social preferences and needs in Poland's urban and rural areas concerning a long-term development strategy initiated by the Government. The project, which was conducted between May and September of 2022 in Poland, focused on the United Nation's Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) and involved five waves of surveys, public discussions, and online activities devoted to Education, Life quality, Green Transition, and Social relations. The analysed sample consists of 1824 unique responses. The results of the project suggest the presence of a proximity bias in each thematic wave, which has implications for participatory decision-making processes at the local and central levels. Proximity bias refers to a tendency for people to prioritize the needs and concerns of their immediate community, or "proximity," over those of more distant communities. This bias manifests in a variety of ways, such as individuals or social groups placing greater importance on local issues and neglecting broader, regional or national concerns. The paper uses logit/probit and pooled OLS models, as well as the discourse analysis to examine the significance of the proximity bias, its geographical pattern (urban vs. rural), and its potential influence on the feasibility of development policy in the context of other factors. The paper contributes to the ongoing discussion on social participation and the delegation of responsibilities between local and central levels of Government in the development of an optimal model of development policy in Poland and other European countries. The paper is most relevant for the “Cities and democracy” conference track as it reflects on the patterns of social participation and decision making from the citizens perspective.

ABSTRACT. “A Vila do Mañá” is an educational and action project, whose main challenge is for children/adolescents to be actively present in the construction processes of the common space. The project arises from the right to the city, whereby the people who live in it have the right to enjoy it, to transform it and to reflect their way of understanding community life. It gives a voice to those who normally do not have it, children/adolescents, promoting their right to be part of an active citizenry, since they will be the ones who inherit and develop the future city, for which "protagonist participation" is encouraged with the Art/ Architecture as tools to carry it out. Architecture has an inalienable responsibility in the face of a society that is being redefined. The need to rethink a quality public space that does not prevent socialization and enjoyment of shared spaces is evident. "A Vila do Mañá" takes children out into the street to explore and build these spaces through play, turned into “homo ludens” who, with a limited series of elements, will freely organize their environment, their New Babylon, the Constant Nieuwenhuys' utopia in which the nomadic society constantly adapts its own environment. Their experience does not end in a week of partying in the city, but rather allows them to reconquer the space as their own and generate synergies that spread to the rest of society. It is necessary to observe the unprejudiced look of those who are used to exploring for the first time and who, faced with the reservations of the adult world, allow themselves to be carried away by curiosity. The project works in search of a new city model where childhood/adolescence are part of active citizenship and have a "protagonist participation" in the creation/transformation of the common space.

ABSTRACT. Transparency and good government are two closely tied concepts that pursue to increase confidence in institutions, to develop quality in governments and to prevent and fight against corruption. Although different mechanisms of transparency and good government are obviously related, they do not often take time at the same pace and there are no mechanisms to coordinate their implementation. In this paper, we intend to assess the process of implementation of transparency and good government mechanisms. In particular, we will focus our attention on the case of local government in Catalonia (Spain). We will analyse if there is coherence and coordination in local governments’ implementation of different mechanisms of transparency and good government and how it may have affected the perception of transparency and corruption of Catalan local governments. The paper will also try to find out which exogenous elements can prevent transparency and good government regulation from improving citizens’ confidence. Finally, the paper will assess the role of electronic means, and particularly, artificial intelligence, in the process of implementation of the legislation of transparency and good government in local governments.

ABSTRACT. A 2005 Heathcott and Murphy article posited that the 1940 to 1980 decline and early resurgence of the economy of the city of St. Louis, Missouri came about due to the emergence of a broader metropolitan vision of economic growth, one that emphasized high-tech R&D and downtown tourism and entertainment to the detriment of long-standing urban industrial corridors. More recent data suggest that while post-1940 policies toward manufacturing resurgence failed, other economic sectors started to gain foot-holds by 1980 as a result of broader, though less appreciated, policy objectives at the time. As a result, “brain-not-brawn” sectors in the city appear to be substantially more resilient than earlier forecasts had concluded. This paper asks the question, whether and how urban manufacturing activity will continue in light of increasing emphasis on non-manufacturing sectors. This study relies on the data and numerous economic development plans and studies since 1980, and interviews with key participants in the post-1980 efforts to revitalize the city’s economy. Taking a deeper look into economic development plans, policies, and leadership since 1980, we will explore whether city and regional efforts have, indeed, borne robust fruit in ways not widely anticipated. Heathcott and Murphy noted a lack of similar efforts toward non-economic (e.g., neighborhoods, workforce, infrastructure) revitalization (other than commitments to higher education and related research). We will examine whether and how resulting urban deterioration indicators are still all-too-visible in the city. Is there a similar lack of neighborhood attention in the last 40 years? Are recent plans and policy efforts creating a stronger response, addressing this imbalance in a more direct way, or are they continuing down the same path?

Heathcott, J., M. Murphy. Corridors of Flight, Zones of Renewal: Industry, Planning, and Policy in the Making of Metropolitan St. Louis, 1940-1980. Journal of Urban History. 31(2). 151-189.

ABSTRACT. The European cohesion policy contributes to strengthening economic, social and territorial cohesion in the European Union, aiming to correct imbalances between territories. Among the policy objectives supported for the programming period 2021-2027, objective 5 focus on “Europe closer to citizens by fostering the sustainable and integrated development of all types of territories”, promoting local Territorial Strategies (ST), and notably urban strategies, with the contribution of the ESIF. Urban strategies for sustainable development, supported by the European Regional and Development Fund (ERDF) and the European Social Fund Plus (ESF+), are going to be implemented in Northern Italy following different progresses and patterns in each region. This contribute intend to explore those strategies in some cities of North Italy concerning the general expected objective to foster sustainable and integrated development of urban territories, with regard to availability, accessibility and affordability of social services and public spaces to citizens. The focus of the research is the political and administrative approach that each region promotes, investigating the governance of the process of construction of the urban strategies rather than the strategies themselves; also due to the fact that few strategies have been already developed. The paper is based on qualitative research and on the basic-applied research methodology, with further grounded theory implications. Stakeholders’ interviews and source analysis are the main instruments applied.

ABSTRACT. As a fundamental component of the urban territory, public space is developed according to a wide range of reasons and under the complex interaction of multiple actors and their interests. The article explores this interaction, analyzing the planning instruments used to qualify public space in the Lisbon Metropolitan Area (LMA). As in other European countries, Portuguese urban development is mostly promoted by private promoters, with public space generally given over to municipalities for management and maintenance. However, public space qualification interventions are mostly funded and implemented by the public sector. Interestingly, most public funding priorities do not consider public space as a focus per se; instead, most of the interventions are aimed at more comprehensive domains, such as urban rehabilitation, sustainable mobility, or social cohesion. However, when looking at the physical result, public space qualification projects occupy a prominent position in the allocation of resources. Furthermore, along with specific agendas and funding priorities of the European Union (EU), a set of non-statutory planning instruments was structured with a view to frame these public intervention projects and these soft non-statutory planning practices emerged parallel to the normative instruments. The article presents a diachronic perspective framed between 2000 and 2022 on the triangular structure: a) the Portugal-EU financing agreements; b) the impact of such agreements on public space projects undertaken in the AML; c) the planning tools used in the programming and execution of these projects. A twenty-year perspective of this triangular interaction offers interesting insights into the political dimension behind the physical interventions carried out. With the significant presence of EU guidelines in Portuguese urban policies, this perspective can also add a relevant field of research on what can be learned from experience and inform future policy formulation, not just at the local level but also at the metropolitan level.

ABSTRACT. Growing cities and regions such as the Federal City of Bonn and its neighbouring counties Rhein-Sieg and Ahrweiler face the challenge of providing affordable housing in line with the demand while dealing with an increasing shortage of the limited resource of land. The potential settlement areas of this region, which include 27 municipalities, were identified and evaluated in an inter-municipal, coordinated process within the NEILA research project. The reconciliation of available land and demand show that the demand can only be met in a sustainable way by means of a region-wide application of higher building densities. This result illustrates the relevance of inter-municipal coordination of settlement development, as a highly complex cross-cutting political issue in which the municipalities' ability to steer beyond their own territorial boundaries can only be expanded through participation in cooperative structures. However, in Germany the field of inter-municipal cooperation in settlement development is based on voluntary participation of the municipalities and therefore constitutes a grand challenge. While most municipalities do seek growth, they want to grow according to their very own vision, which often opposes higher density.

In this contribution, the learnings from establishing an inter-municipal cooperation in the complex field of settlement development will be examined integrating both the perspectives of research and practice. As a theoretical approach, the highly fragmented settlement development process will be examined as a problem of collective action through the Institutional Collective Action (ICA) framework developed by Richard Feiock (2013). The practice perspective will be integrated through the evaluation of interviews and questionnaires with planners from the participating municipalities to assess the practical learnings and the transferability of the results.

Feiock, R. C. (2013): The institutional collective action framework. Policy Studies Journal 41, 3, 397–425. https://doi.org/10.1111/psj.12023.

ABSTRACT. An heterogeneous metropolis, Lisbon is an outstanding laboratory to explore the multiple sides of public space in its strong relationship with the territory. The paper articulates Lisbon’s metropolitan area territorial evolution and the characteristics of public space qualification projects that have been produced and shaped in the past two decades, with the aim of outlining their general rationales of contribution to territorial development. Resorting to Reynar Bahnam’s terminology, an array of interpretative ‘ecologies’ is outlined by pinpointing the convergence between specific landscape conditions and the urban spaces in which everyday public life takes place and new threads of metropolitan identity unfold. These ecologies are understood as interpretative syntheses in which public space is revealed in its multi-scalar geographical dimensions – from local urban spaces to territorial landscapes – and in its multi-systemic capacity – a construction dealing both with natural and human flows. Furthermore, and analogously with Banham’s method to decode Los Angeles’ complexity, such interpretation emphasizes the combination of the topographical with the historical and the relationship of specific and layered spatial patterns with the contingent and emerging events that continuously reshape the urbanized territory. Such approach is organized in two steps: firstly, by looking at the recent development in Lisbon, where one can detect a significant number of public space qualification projects that have been implemented in tandem with a wider structural change in its urban and regional dynamics; secondly, by tracing and mapping relevant situations – or ‘ecologies’ – in which these public space projects have engaged with specific topographical, infrastructural and built urban structures. More than providing an outline of the particular case of Lisbon’s development, these ecologies are expected to suggest potential lines of territorial re-organization based on public space interventions with relevance to contemporary policy and design across our cities and metropolises.

ABSTRACT. The covid pandemic has given rise to the notion, and anticipation, of a "new normal", reflecting changes in attitudes and behaviours evident as COVID-19 propelled cities and citizens through a decade of digital transformation overnight. COVID-19 now joins the climate emergency in highlighting the importance of resilience and adaptability in urban planning whilst throwing into sharp relief the limitations of urban governance and demonstrating the urgency for new solutions. Urban planners are responding to these challenges and actively working to understand how to envision the net-zero neighbourhood as hubs of living and working, including the visions of the 15-minute city, and how to shape behavioural change strategies to respond to the new socio-economic and spatial realities of cities. However, the limitations of existing urban governance models are thoroughly exposed by the demands of an integrated and transformative planning essential to the delivery of “new normal” solutions. The redefinition of design principles and operational rules for a "new urban governance" calls for an urban planning method able to transition from a centralized, top-down perspective engaging with bottom-up solutions. Smart city governance enabled by information and communication technologies (ICT) aims to support the definition and delivery of tools and methodologies that address top-down integrated urban planning while simultaneously interconnecting open governance service and the co-design of bottom-up planning solutions. This presentation draws on the author's experience in EU-funded smart city governance research and innovation projects over the past decade, outlining the smart city governance model that deploys satellite-derived intelligence to promote enhanced ICT-enabled city governance. In addition the presentation addresses research questions concerning the relevance of an open, integrated, and interoperable model of urban governance and planning (Smarticipate, 2019), considering its application via a digital-twin ensemble (Copernicus-derived methodologies), as well as lessons learned from recent EU research and innovation projects.

ABSTRACT. Urban development is a complex area of public administration and governance, comprising many stakeholders/actors, and a mix of resource allocation mechanisms (hierarchy, market and network rationalities, respectively). This complexity makes it challenging for local governments to accommodate smart and sustainable development. Smart cities have become a popular subject of study in recent years, and has evolved since Hollands asked the smart city to please stand up in his article from 2008. The concept often entails a focus on technology, human capital, or collaborative governance. I argue that one needs a combination of these three features to call a city smart, which includes having a strong(er) local government as a facilitator for the development. This paper focuses on the smart city of northern Norway, and features an in-depth case study of the (relatively) minor city of Bodø, with a population of just over 50 000. Data comprise semistructured interviews with government officials, political and administrative leaders, as well as representatives from local industry and commerce. In addition, government strategy documents were also part of the data. The aim of this paper is to address what is necessary to foster smart and sustainable development in small cities located in peripheral areas.

ABSTRACT. The processes of transformation of contemporary territories in Europe are becoming progressively homogenized. Nevertheless, similar economic, technical and cultural factors invest distant and separate places, whether urban and metropolitan or isolated and embedded in natural contexts, where there are conditions of resource exploitation: thus, while the rhetoric of regeneration (and the market factors that feed it) lead to the transformation of cities by modifying existing spaces, phenomena of "operational" development, indifferent to territorial and landscape factors, linked to self-referenced location principles, invest both central and remote areas (the mountainous areas, the coastal areas, the agricultural lowland areas). These facts present themselves as particularly evident in many coastal areas. In these territories, there is a profound contrast between the relevance of natural facts (and the increased hazard and risk factors related to climate change), their landscape evidence, adaptation needs, the impact of ongoing transformations (port, logistics, tourism,...), technological, urban and settlement choices. The outcome is the formation of dystopian places, disconnected from the historical territorial palimpsest, indifferent to the landscape and destined to a likely rapid process of wear and tear. The paper intends to deepen a line of reflection introduced at the 2022 edition of EURA on the relevance of the landscape point of view and the form of the ATLAS (as eclectic and site-specific strategic text) in governing and directing these transformations: it is indeed necessary to bring back into a space of evidence of the visible and the sensitive the transformation choices, rules and directions. However, this must be done with strong relationships with both local communities and other stakeholders and rights, not necessarily local. This requires new descriptions: of specific elements, processes and relationships that reveal how landscapes are viewed, conceptualized and valued.

ABSTRACT. This paper aims to explore the potential of digital placemaking tools in strengthening the development of towns. With the increasing digitization and the influence of social media in everyday life, placemaking has undergone a transformation with successful outcomes in different cities worldwide. Digital placemaking offers new opportunities for urban regeneration by providing a multifaceted exchange of information and views and by boosting the social, cultural, environmental, and economic value of places (de Filippi et al., 2020; Freeman et al., 2019). Furthermore, the method of co-creation enables communities and their citizens to be involved in the process of detecting and solving problems from the beginning until the implementation of possible solutions. The paper focuses on small and medium cities along the Danube. Although these cities are shrinking, they have a specific potential to increase local prosperity and international tourist attractiveness by reactivating underused cultural heritage and resources. In the paper, several digital placemaking tools developed during the Interreg project DANUrB+ will be presented: (1) The digital Platform, an inclusive online communication tool containing data of different stakeholders, their products and services, as well as tangible and intangible cultural heritage; (2) The mobile applications with predefined tours of a city, which were designed to inform tourists of unusual, interesting and forgotten heritage places; (3) The interactive Digital Atlas with educational and promotional qualities for the Danubian region and (4) The variety of online surveys used during the design of Action plans and Pilot projects for small and medium Danube towns. The research results are presented as possible insights into the future of placemaking and the success stories about the development and implementation of different digital tools for enhancing the overall development of small and medium-sized cities in Europe facing the problem of depopulation and devastation.

ABSTRACT. This study examines Taiwan's 2050 goal of achieving net-zero emissions and the corresponding changes to the spatial development strategy. The Shalun Smart Green Energy Science City, developed and guided by national policy since 2017, was a unique demonstration site for green energy research and development. With the area’s feature of test and verification for new technology, the concept of "regulatory sandbox" is employed as a theoretical framework to explore the current state of transport services in the area. A regulatory sandbox is an environment where new innovations can be tested under the supervision of a regulator. The concept aims to facilitate innovation such as new products, technologies, business models and policies in a safe and responsible manner. In this study, the Demand Responsive Transit Service bus was the empirical theme for smart mobility. Interviews were conducted with service providers, researchers, and user management units within the Shalun Science City area. The findings of these interviews and site surveys were then used to make adaptive planning regulation recommendations and smart mobility solution in responsive to net-zero emission goal.

ABSTRACT. Share and repair organisations (SROs) have important implications for resource efficiency and socio-economic sustainability in cities, but their potential to contribute to long-term urban resilience has not been systematically investigated. Knowledge is scarce on how these nascent circular initiatives can provide building blocks for recovery in the wake of socio-economic crises caused by sudden shocks (e.g., pandemics, natural disasters, military conflicts), and the opportunities SROs offer for long-term urban resilience. Recent crises caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine bring societal urgency to this research. The aim of this paper is to build a forward-looking agenda for interdisciplinary research on circular urban resilience. We call for developing knowledge and theory on circular urban resilience to advance the understanding and explore relationships between the circular and sharing economy and urban resilience, thereby helping transform our cities towards resilience. This work is underpinned by four avenues for research and practice. There is a need for empirical evidence on short-term responses of SROs to high-impact low-probability crises in different cities (Avenue 1), on how municipalities around the world have engaged with SROs when responding to such crises (Avenue 3). This empirical account would help unpack the potential of SROs to support long-term resilience in cities (Avenue 2), and advance resilient urban systems by identifying pathways for municipalities to unlock the potential of SROs for long-term urban resilience (Avenue 4). Future research on circular urban resilience should not only trigger a fundamental shift in the conceptualisation of share and repair strategies in light of urban resilience, but also provide new ways for building resilient, just, and sustainable cities. Key messages to actors advancing sustainable cities and communities are to: 1) set urban resilience as a strategic goal; and 2) operationalise resilience and, when relevant, connect urban resilience and circular economy agendas.

ABSTRACT. Cities and municipalities in Portugal experienced in the last 15 years periods of crisis and recessions (bailouts, Covid-19, inflation) with short periods fiscal expansion. This strong financial volatility imposes strong management constraints through a severe limitation of their fiscal policy space. The consequence of this evolution is an increasing pressure to competition with their neighbors, the so-called yardstick competition. The article asks two related question: i) What are the factors that influence the setting of tax rates in Portuguese municipalities? ii) Is it possible to identify signs of tax competition among them and, if so, in which tax is this competition most evident? The empirical analysis focuses on the 278 municipalities of mainland Portugal and analyzes the following local taxes: Municipal Property Tax, Surcharge on corporate taxable income, Reduced Surcharge and the portion of Income Tax for Individuals. The empirical results provide evidence of the existence of strategic interactions among Portuguese municipalities when they set the rates of their local taxes.

ABSTRACT. Within the context of rising rents and growing unhoused population, public authorities are compelled to adapt their own practices, to create low-cost social policies and sometimes to draw inspiration from informal housing practices. Through the analysis of the institutional adoption of the ‘tiny home’ village model in Portland as a means of sheltering the homeless, this article examines the extent to which these informal practices spread into public policies and reconfigure the governance of homelessness. It points out that, although political struggle and advocacy have been crucial in the regularization of the first homeless villages by public authorities, the way the village model is currently being institutionalized tends both to depoliticize the way they are operated and to reproduce some of the constraints associated with congregate shelters.

ABSTRACT. The aim of this presentation is to link current refugee migration from Ukraine to previous patterns of residential segregation of migrants in Prague (Czechia) and discuss its relevance and socio-economic impacts. First, we set the context by describing residential segregation in Prague metropolitan area using method of individualized scalable (bespoke) neighbourhoods. This application of this method allows to compare the distribution of minority and majority population on multiple spatial scales and compare it to traditional methods. This analysis is based on individual-level geo-coded data on the foreign population from the records of the Ministry of the Interior, available for years 2012–2018. The analysis will apply indices of segregation and cartographic visualisation of data. Secondly, we present new data on current migration wave from Ukraine to Czechia. The number of “refugees” in 2022 more than doubled previous numbers of migrants in the country, with a profound impact on health care system, housing market, labour market and educational system. This task would include presentation of new data on registered “refugees”, its advantages and limits for analytical and policy use. This task would also include presentation of key results of currently running survey-based research on Ukrainians in Czechia. In conclusion, the presentation will summarise key lesson learned and discuss current challenges for research on migration and integration.

ABSTRACT. Coastal environments are under stress due to various hazardous events and growing risks of climate change. Ports and marinas, in particular, form an integral part of the cultural, economic, and social infrastructure of the coastal areas. Moreover, because of the increasing threats and the intensity of the marina activities, ports are facing immense challenges rendering these areas vulnerable and prone to suffer many direct and indirect effects.

European policies are urging a green transition to mitigate the effects of climate change. However, there are some gaps in the strategic planning of small ports and a lack of involvement and consultation of local actors and institutions governing the port, and thus hindering the creation of resilient systems.

Through the development and transformation of the spatial dimension, ports and their waterfronts play a significant role in reducing carbon emissions, improving connectivity, and promoting competitiveness. The study highlights main policy gaps, and suggests how the urban and spatial scales should be taken into account through strategies, planning tools (ICZM, MSP), land/sea interaction, policies, and governance.

The data were collected as part of the FRAMESPORT project “Framework Initiative Fostering the Sustainable Development of Adriatic Small Ports”, following the high level public consultations and surveys done locally and regionally on the Adriatic coasts of Italy and Croatia. Surveys were submitted to understand stakeholders’ perceptions on the needs for the future of small ports.

This research shows a catalog of ideas: a taxonomy in research and in practice is developed following the reflection from regional stakeholders and actors about the spatial, cultural and institutional dimensions of ports. The study wishes to bring a contribution in strategy definition to transform and redevelop ports into resilient areas addressing the fundamental topics of: air quality, climate change, energy efficiency, relations with local communities, waste, port and land development.

ABSTRACT. It is now clear that, no matter how sustainability is defined it cannot be achieved without considering landscape and, we would add, even more so, water landscapes. It is thus that regeneration interventions linked to waterlines can be set up to address and challenge environmental resilience, broader integrated ‘water-urban arrangement’ and context-based design strategies, while also playing a key role in improving inhabitants' well-being and social cohesion. Today, open spaces bound to visible or invisible (channelled and buried) waterlines support an appealing and winning urban regeneration formula. Urbanised areas historically marked by water seem to be terrains where urban policy aspires to build a green and liveable metropolitan future and to promote a new image of the city. Furthermore, especially at a time of mobility restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic, we recognise the attraction of riverside promenades as well as green areas and paths along drainage corridors. Responding to the lack of relevant prescriptions and design guidelines, the work considers interventions located in the ‘City of the Tagus Estuary’ - the city set along the Tagus Estuary water system (Lisbon Metropolitan Area, Portugal) - to understand commonly implemented practices for waterside projects. The work analyses recent realised public riverside regeneration projects facing the Tagus Estuary water system; the focus is on quality factors and components that work together with the visual stimuli of the green and blue scenes. Considering water as a 'project material', this research will explore how the land-water limit (the land-water interface) is designed. The work will record the shapes, uses, predominant colours, and construction materials used in the regeneration projects. By creating ‘abacuses’ of interventions, suggestions will be made to exploit the full potential of the estuarine landscape's proximity to water.

ABSTRACT. In the context of the rehabilitation of former industrial districts into mixed-use neighbourhoods to meet the city’s current needs and to avoid urban sprawl, building typology changing, soil unsealing and revegetation are displayed as goals by the public authorities. These soil transformations aim to improve quality of life and city resilience (reducing heat island effects, decreasing flood risks, …). However, these transformations are also facing challenges, like soil pollution, high division of private ownership and densification pressure.

This paper presents a methodology to analyse and estimate, both at large scale and at small scale, the positive and negative impacts of soil transformations and the links between authorities' objectives and on-field operationalisation. This methodology calls upon different disciplines, such as urbanism, hydrogeology and pedology, to allow a decompartmentalised analysis of soils in the urban system. The case of the Cureghem District in Brussels, Belgium, is studied, as this district is facing issues that can be found in many European cities: pollution coming from its industrial past, increasing flood risks and heat waves due to climate change.

At larger scale, this paper proposes a systemic perspective highlighting the interrelations and interconnections between the built environment, the soil and the underlaying subsoil. This three-dimensional approach enables the reconceptualisation of urban soils based on these interrelations, highlighting the ecological opportunities or the critical impacts of soil transformations.

At the scale of the plot/block, the integration of detailed data concerning soil contamination, mixed use of the buildings, protection of heritage buildings and infiltration potential allows the expression of global objectives into applied mechanisms leading to the achievement of those objectives. This analysis highlights levers and obstacles to an environmentally friendly urban soil transformation.

In Cureghem case, the articulation of the visions based on these two scales enlightens authorities' decisions up to their application.

ABSTRACT. In line with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, the European Commission has adopted a "Mission" approach for European cities to reach climate neutrality targets by 2030 (Mazzucato, 2018). Cities throughout Europe, including 7 cities in Spain, have committed to take action to accelerate their urban transformations to achieve this environmental objective.

While this novel "Mission" policy framework unfolds in practice, it is worth acknowledging that, in the last decade, cities in Europe and in other places have engaged in climate action (Shabb, McCormick 2022). A better understanding about how to govern "urban transformations" seems relevant to inform European Missions for cities as they unfold in practice. Examining what practitioners have been doing in the last decade in the North, and what governance approaches have been used to implement transformative adaptation and mitigation measures, could be useful to bring closer the policy rhetoric of urban transformations and on-the-ground implementation (Van der Hejden, 2018). Therefore, understanding what governance strategies have been implemented to support urban transformation towards sustainability is the object of this review.

Focusing on papers that analyze empirical cases in cities of the Global North, this systematic literature review asks how these cities have, thus far, managed and implemented their climate mitigation and adaptation agendas locally? Findings show that governing beyond experiments remains a challenge in the North even in cities that are well-resourced and champions in environmental and climate change (Wamsler, 2015). Novel policy frameworks to address adaptation and mitigation still struggle to "permeate city-wide planning" and "programmes and regulations still remain patches within overall city policy and planning" (Holsher, 2019).

ABSTRACT. This paper will address the potential of using computer games to inspire collective action for climate adaptation in neighborhoods. The applied research project ‘Communities for Climate Change Action’ is developing a computer game that is modeled on particular neighborhoods in Warsaw and will use this game to create awareness of local challenges related to climate change, present mitigation, and adaptation measures tailored to these neighborhoods, and facilitate community initiatives to implement such measures. The game combines map data with realistic data on environmental variables such as temperature, rain, and pollution to create a game environment where the players can expose themselves to future scenarios and explore different actions they can take to mitigate and adapt to climate change in their neighborhood. Examples of actions that can be embedded in the game are establishing rain beds to reduce the effects of heavy rain, solar installations to reduce the use of fossil energy sources, and planting trees to reduce heat island effects. The paper will discuss how computer games can offer possibilities for inspiring active engagement for climate adaptation in neighborhoods. We will highlight the following design options: Leveraging locality (using spatial data to create a game environment modeled on a neighborhood), system simulation and experimentation (facilitating the exploration of different climate adaptation measures, linking choices and consequences, and facilitating reflection and learning), and collaborative problem solving (bringing citizens together in the game environment to collaborate on challenges they also face in their physical environment). Challenges appearing in the design process will also be discussed, such as simplifying complex information without compromising the accuracy of the information the game will convey.

ABSTRACT. The challenges facing Europe’s cities feel increasingly daunting. To meet them, cities will have to innovate – this includes governance reforms that target the inner workings of local governments, but also how they interface with citizens, private actors, and other authorities, at various scales. Different cities will have different priorities, strategies, and capacities. To map these differences, identify areas of concern, and outline potential governance and policy implications, we draw on a new database of 166 large European cities from 38 countries. Assembled through secondary sources, the data covers issues such as the profile of the mayors, the cities’ stated climate ambitions, the existing conditions in high impact policy sector s that are typically under the local governments’ jurisdiction, among other relevant factors. In addition to a rich description of patterns across European cities, the paper presents a preliminary analysis of the determinants of progressive, experimental, or radical political action . We conclude with a list of practical recommendations for European city leaders, structured into long-term and short-term types of interventions.

ABSTRACT. Since the 2014-2020 programming cycle the European Union has increasingly emphasised the need for regional development to consider development strategies that involve spatially and economically interlinked territories. An exemplary case is the sustainable development strategies that cities are expected to deliver, for which a wider spatial focus – such as metropolitan areas and/or city networks – and a more explicit reference to the FUAs concept, are advocated. Strategies for these wider spatial configurations entail stronger inter-municipal cooperation and, ideally, multi-scalar governance relations in order to involve a variety of territorial stakeholders. While the benefits of these partnerships to solve a myriad of urban questions is perfectly clear, equally evident are the risks and challenges for policy deriving from the high political fragmentation in these territories. In Italy, municipalities have been cooperating using a highly diversified range of collaborative arrangements, ranging from voluntary organisational networks to mandatory forms of inter-municipal cooperation. At the same time, while some regions have a well-established experience in the use of innovative institutional arrangements, others are still lagging behind. In this context, this study looks into the case of sustainable urban development in Sicily, where new mechanisms to select the territorial targets of the urban agenda have been introduced for the 2021-2027 programming cycle. Here, with the adoption of the FUAs approach to select the eligible municipalities of the urban agenda, a less flexible and bottom-up territorialisation process is being implemented. By analysing the implications of this choice for the West of Sicily urban system, the paper provides a critical evaluation of the pros and cons of this and other territorialisation mechanisms, from both the planning and governance perspectives.

ABSTRACT. European cities find themselves in a constantly changing environment that brings challenges, opportunities and constraints for the local level. These include not only the multiple crises of recent years, but also concrete problems of municipalities such as limited financial and human resources. Embedded in the European multi-level system, addressing these challenges and seizing opportunities takes place in a European context. However, operating under the conditions of the European multi-level system not only provides local governments with new opportunities for dealing with urban challenges. Instead, operating successfully in the European multi-level system is itself a challenging proposition, one in which cities across Europe are increasingly specializing. In this paper, we address this challenge by asking to what extent institutional and organisational factors at the municipal level influence the ability of cities to actively participate in the European policy process while enabling cities to deal with challenges influenced by Europe. The paper presents fresh quantitative and qualitative data from a current research project focusing on the German case to examine the local levels’ role as the basic territory in the European multi-level system. Using the German municipalities as an example, we explore how the local level in Europe is adapting to both the challenges and opportunities of the European multi-level system while at the same time shaping it. For this purpose, we distinguish four dimensions (Uploading, Downloading, Horizontal Networking, Communication), that illustrate how Europeanisation affects the local level and which activities municipalities have developed in response to the challenges and opportunities of Europeanization. In a first step of analysis, we empirically investigate the institutional and organisational conditions under which Europe-related activities are carried out at the local level in Germany. In a second step, we empirically investigate the variety of local level Europe-related activities in the four dimensions of Europeanization.

ABSTRACT. This panel calls for papers about challenges for European Cities, such as climate change, COVID recovery, migration pressures or inequalities. We believe that these challenges cannot be tackled just at a municipal level: the solutions need to be rescaled at a metropolitan scale. However, the political recognition of metropolitan regions in Europe is uneven: while countries like Italy, France and United Kingdom have undergone recent reforms to institutionalise metropolitan spaces, other countries like Spain lack of a national policy of metropolitan governance.

In this paper we present some of the results of the METROGOV (Metropolitan Governance in Spain) project, funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation. This work tries to answer two fundamental questions: what are the instruments currently used to govern the metropolitan phenomenon in Spain? Which factors explain the anomalous situation in Spain when it comes to institutionalizing metropolitan authorities? The research is based on a mixed quantitative and qualitative methodology. Firstly, a database on cooperation instruments in the Spanish functional areas has been created and analysed. Secondly, six in-depth study case studies have been developed: Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Bilbao and Vigo urban functional areas and its public policy instruments. Both methodologies have allowed us to identify similarities and differences between cases of a semi-federal State and, at the same time, identify the facilitating factors and barriers for the development of metropolitan governance in Spain.

ABSTRACT. The local government of Bratislava established a new unit called "Metropolitan Institute of Bratislava" several years ago. Approximately at the same time, this local government decided to strengthen capacities in the field of planning as well as evidence-based policy making. Thanks to such an increase of internal capacities, this local government has become one of the front-runners in the field of adoption of various participatory tools and measures. This paper focuses on two participatory tools that were adopted in the capital of Slovakia, namely participatory budgeting and participatory planning. Whilst participatory budgeting was adopted with great expectations and failed just a few years later, the experience with participatory planning offers a significantly different story, and it is successfully used even nowadays (for instance, in cases of planning of public spaces or within gradual implementation of a city parking policy). A main research goal is to uncover circumstances that impacted both adoption and implementation of these tools, analyse them from the perspective of the theory of policy diffusion, and point out the most crucial policy implications. Besides description of relevant events, a series of interviews with relevant policy actors as well as representatives of the local government were conducted for data collection. These data are analysed in a comparative perspective, and help us to understand the sensitiveness of participatory tools, and their dependence on compliance between expectations and real outcomes. In addition, the analysed data clearly confirm the importance of initial policy-making stages for further steps. On this matter, one of the main conclusion is that the underestimating the preparation for the adoption of any participatory tool can lead to its failure or unintended outcomes.

ABSTRACT. The beginnings of social participation in Poland, inviting communities to actively take part in local development, date back to early 1990s. when in response to political and economic transitions of the country, self-government of territorial units was restored. Over last two decades local development processes involve local authorities, NGOs, social movements, inhabitants, enterprises, providing an interesting scope of a “game” over particular territory.

The aim of this paper is to discuss the participatory budget as the popular tool for local development implemented in Polish municipalities, especially in urban areas. Although there is no single universally applicable participatory budget model, results of H2020 RELOCAL project, focused on the city of Lodz as well as results of further research conducted in middle-size towns of central Poland confirm that this tool empowers communities and increases social trust in local authorities. Participatory budget is induced by local leaders and activists but brings opportunity for all inhabitants to (co-) decide about the shape of the nearest neighborhood according to their current needs and opportunities. Being engaged in applying for funding and promoting local projects strongly integrates people, develops their place-identities, makes them understand place-based development, and allows to be proud of the results of joint activities for the city. Projects effectively implemented within the participatory budget reduce inequalities between neighborhoods at local scale and at the same time, as entire cities develop through these projects, their position within the region or the country increase as well.

After a decade of experiences, it is possible to reflect about dynamics of participatory budget in Polish cities and discuss it as a learning process both for local communities, as well as for local authorities which improve the design of a tool due to place and time driven conditions.

ABSTRACT. The call for new participatory procedures in representative democracies has been growing louder for many years. For urban planning, it is important to involve citizens or interest groups in the political process at an early stage so that they can be actively involved in local policy-making. Different levels of participation are possible, ranging from simply informing citizens to joint participation formats. Whereas information and consultation processes are standard at the local level, the use of participation in form of co-creation is still in its infancy. Therefore, our paper focuses on the latter and explores citizen participation in the field of urban mobility as part of the energy transition to make cities more resilient to climate change. This includes both the planning of new mobility offers and a fundamental change in the behaviour of citizens. We focus primarily on innovative forms of co-creation involving citizens at an early stage and enabling them to contribute their own arguments bottom-up, exchange knowledge and experience mutual learning (Langer et al. 2018), and take a closer look at digital participation tools. Central questions in this context are how such co-creation participation can be designed and how people's willingness to participate can be increased through new digital tools. Following Arnstein's detailed 'Ladder of Participation' (1969), we conceptualise participation as a three-stage model: (1) information, (2) consultation and (3) co-creation (Lortz/Kachel/Knodt 2022; Lortz et al. 2022). Following the literature on deliberation, only co-creation can positively influence acceptance. Our case study is based on a specially conducted representative survey in the city of Darmstadt, which collected people's preferences and perceptions regarding participation. For the design of innovative participation, we will present data of our experimental design study and we employ multivariate regression analyses and build a path analysis model to test our hypothesis about the willingness to participate.

ABSTRACT. In Finland the interest towards participatory budgeting (PB) has steadily grown. One reason behind the popularity can be found from the Local Government Act that highlights the residents' possibility to participate in the planning of the municipality’s finances.

We analyse PB in two Finnish cases from the view of organisations. The adoption and implementation of PB has evoked questions and contradictions within administrative organisations. We approach PB in the context of change of paradigms, from new public management to new public governance and collaborative governance. We see that this change requires a wider transformation in local governments and that PB could be one tool to foster this change. With case studies of cities of Tampere and Lahti, we illustrate how the ideals of PB clash with organisational boundaries.

In Tampere, PB was first implemented as a pilot project in one of the city’s neighbourhoods. The pilot was followed by a city-level PB process that met several obstacles in implementation. For example, diverse service areas of the city did not share a common understanding of PB's core idea. There was also a confusion about responsibilities related to pre-examination of PB proposals and their cost-evaluation. Technological challenges were caused by the PB platform demanding lot of extra work from the PB team.

Lahti demonstrates a case where the citizen engagement collapsed with traditional, hierarchic processes and limited resources for PB in the context of city’s difficult financial situation. Politicians were keen to push the piloting of PB, but the administration did not fully accept the idea and the way PB could transform the traditional processes of financial decision-making.

We argue, that at its best PB can be a way to more collaborative administration. However, this requires institutionalisation of PB but also the willingness to develop and transform organisational routines and practices.

ABSTRACT. In the last two decades, across the world, there has been a proliferation of innovations and participatory experiments, at diverse scales and with different institutional designs. In Portugal, public participation in municipal planning has been a small entrance for a more comprehensive local participatory governance. The cycles of production and revision of statutory plans, to which participation is mandatory, are too long and there are no institutional solutions for keeping the citizens engaged between the sparse participatory events assisting plans approval. Still, municipal plans deal with structural spatial and functional aspects that are crucial to the future liveability of cities. However, in parallel with plans, cities are subject to significant transformations through investments which are not antecipated in, or encompassed by, statutory plans. On the one hand, European city policy cycles are fuelling major urban transformations which, despite guidance, are in general poorly assisted by participatory processes. On the other hand, at the local and neighbourhood levels, smaller investments are taking place according to political conveniences. In both cases, the localized nature of projects would constitute opportunities for engaging citizens in decision-making and co-creation actions. Thus, there are these two dimensions of participatory efforts, which according to the literature might enhance the sustainability of urban changes, underpinned by social interactions that help to building up of a sense of place belonging and social capital. This work mobilizes relevant literature for addressing the tackled dimensions of local participation and the accumulated experience of participatory efforts. Namely, it explores the role of minipublics and other local governance arrangements, as well as co-creation and co-management methodologies which may inform institutional aspects that should be brought to in the establishment of a more robust local participatory framework for urban planning in Portugal, towards co-governance schemes in a continuous, sustainable, and more democratic way.

ABSTRACT. Cities are governed by means of spatial governance and planning systems which are not identical. These are institutional technologies inspired by different social models and based on various devices (Nadin & Stead, 2008; Janin Rivolin, 2012, 2017). Recent studies (Nadin et al., 2020; Hossu et al., 2020) have clarified how European systems involve an increasing number of actors, including partnerships with private sector interests and civil society actors in decision-making. This trend is currently interpreted in terms of co-production within planning theory and practice (Watson, 2014). Elinor Ostrom (1996) defines it as ‘the process through which inputs used to produce a good or service are contributed by individuals who are not “in” the same organisation’ (p. 1073). In this sense, co-production is a multifaceted concept encompassing a range of experiences that differ in both the ‘co-’ and the ‘production’ sides of the concept (Sicilia et al., 2016; Sorrentino et al., 2018). When applied to the spatial governance and planning realm, the ‘co-’ side concerns the openness of (local) governments – i.e. the actor delegated to assign land use and development rights – to the involvement of actors ranging from civil society to property developers with their interests. In its turn, the ‘production’ side can involve different types of “stakes”, from the rights of inclusion to the supply and quality of certain services to the quantities of buildable and exploitable space etc. In this light, examining cases identified in various European countries and based on some initial outcomes (Bragaglia et al., 2023), the proposed paper aims to clarify between which actors and for what purpose co-production takes place in various European contexts. Moreover, the paper seeks to understand whether and how the proposed taxonomy can be related to “types” of European spatial governance and planning systems (Berisha et al., 2021).

ABSTRACT. Predominantly in bigger cities we can find political attempts and experiments to add participative and deliberate procedures to the formal settings of institutional political structures. While the lifestyles and experiences of different social classes and milieus are drifting more and more apart, different reasons to turn away from democratic practices and institutions are growing stronger. In order to attenuate the „crisis of local governance“ these experiments target to relieve administration and political institutions from overburdening, to enhance trust and identification with the city and its residents and thus, strengthen social cohesion as well. Thus, it becomes a challenging mission to bridge the gap between representative democracy and participative direct democracy. The contribution to the EURA-conference will present a case study about the process of discussion and implementation of participative elements in the city of Bremen. This case study is not only an academic research work, but examines the political process as a transdisciplinary living lab, in which the academic research team is directly involved by expert interviews, workshops, public events and political reflections besides many other players, i.e. citizen‘s initiatives, social networks, representatives of government, political parties and parliament. As a major result of the research works, it appears that despite positive public communication there is only weak interest of political institutions and actors to support the implementation of direct democratic structures. The paper will also discuss how scientific expertise can help to convey the living lab resp. the political process.

ABSTRACT. The importance of signifying territory, cities, urban areas and marginal areas is linked with the enhancement of the sense of belonging. Urban, physical and sensory elements are transmitters of a personal and collective memory. In their material and immaterial consistency, physical and sensory elements lead citizens towards a process of personal and group identification develops as fragments of landscapes, soundscapes, smellscapes etc. Physical and sensory elements are scattered along the routes we walk in the cities we inhabit and they are made up of the relationships between histories, people and places. Therefore, these composite urban landscapes retain the existential spirit of cities and stimulate a sense of belonging and a sense of place. The way we think about the cities we inhabit determines our attachment to them and, therefore, has an influence on our participation in the public and political life of our spaces. For these reasons, reasoning about attachment to places of living and enhancing an understanding of the sense of place and sense of identity is an important tool to broaden civic participation in urban life. On the basis of these reflections, an experiential learning workshop was conducted in Italy, around Lake Como and the historic centre of the city with the students of the University of Insubria who, during a number of participatory walks, both in groups and on their own, worked using sensory ethnography to deepen their attachment to the places of everyday living.

ABSTRACT. European cities have been receiving growing numbers of international migrants in the last decades. This has led to a rising number of studies examining the effects of migration-driven ethnic diversity for the livelihoods and cohesion of European neighborhoods. Several works have found a negative association between ethnic diversity and indicators of community cohesion, such as neighborhood identities, local trust and political participation, and sense of belonging. However, some works have shown that these negative effects are moderated by the quality of social and interethnic contact among neighbors. Yet, extant works usually consider only one dimension of social cohesion, and measure interethnic contact as casual (weak) ties or using attitudinal variables. I add to this literature by uncovering what types of interethnic contact (strong ties, weak ties, conflictual relations; organizationally-driven ties) affect which dimensions (sense of belonging, solidarities, safety, civic participation) of community cohesion. I use data from a survey applied to the migrant and autochthonous residents of eighteen ethnically diverse neighborhoods located in six European cities (Bilbao, Spain; Lisbon, Portugal; Rotterdam, Netherlands; Thessaloniki, Greece; Vienna, Austria; Warsaw, Poland). Computing logistic regressions predicting various dimensions of community cohesion, I find that: (a) weak interethnic ties are positively associated with stronger neighborhood belonging, but have no effect on the other dimensions; (b) strong interethnic ties have a positive effect on neighborhood belonging, as well as on civic participation and feelings of safety; (c) negative interethnic ties are associated with lower neighborhood belonging, but do not affect the other dimensions; (d) the effects of strong interethnic ties on cohesion vary more across socio-demographic features (who you are), while the effects of weak ties depend more on one’s practices (what you do); and (e) only local institutions that foster both civic participation and interethnic contact have a positive effect for enhancing community cohesion.

ABSTRACT. The ongoing rise of habitation in cities and the growing inequality puts pressure on the quality of the social environment. Therefore, the societal role and the quality of public space are more important than ever. Public spaces are a critical asset for cities that play a vital role in the social life of communities. Meanwhile, under the broad concept of resilience and in response to local challenges that directly affect people and communities, community resilience is receiving attention. The proposed study will focus on the relationship between public space and community resilience through the empirical research of a practice which works on a variety of scale levels in the city of Rotterdam, one of the 100 Resilient Cities network. This study is grounded in the constructed framework for studying community resilience based on three interrelated elements that are highlighted within the multidisciplinary literature on this topic: community networks, people-place connections, and community infrastructure. To get a more comprehensive understanding of public space and its influence on community resilience, an interdisciplinary approach to the topic is taken. Understanding public space in all its manifestations has the potential to blur the disciplinary distinctions and inspire new ways of thinking that go beyond dichotomies. With allying social science and spatial design, this study emphasises understanding space as a place for communities or a multitude of people, also the relationship between the physical and social environment and the experience. Observations and interviews are the main data collection methods that are particularly applicable for understanding the interrelation between spatial conditions and social connections. The aim of observation is to describe the characteristics of a place and identify how communities use, appropriate, and experience such a public space.