The Dublin Dashboard provides citizens, public sector workers and companies with real-time information, time-series indicator data, and interactive maps about all aspects of the city. It enables users to gain detailed, up to date intelligence about the city that aids everyday decision making and fosters evidence-informed analysis.
The Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality is proud to launch “Digi-Dog,” a first of its kind initiative to equip dogs and their owners with the digital tools they need to thrive in a “Smart City”. Tel Aviv is home to 25,000 registered dogs, and the ratio of dogs to humans (1:17), is considered one of the highest in the world.
The Green Bank, which the DC Council voted to establish in July, will provide public money in the form of loans, leases and other mechanisms to help fund green projects that expand renewable energy, reduce energy costs and GHG emissions, and create green jobs. The Green Bank will initially be funded at $7 million a year for five years, with that money generated from the city’s renewable energy development fund, which was created for utilities and energy suppliers to pay into in the form of alternative compliance payments if they do not meet carbon emissions goals in DC.
Voted the least attractive city to grow up in in 2006, Rotterdam has since spent €15m (£13.2m) on improvements to public spaces, housing and safe traffic routes in lower income neighbourhoods in an effort to build a child-friendly city. An open space in a city park forest has been converted into a nature playground – Natuurspeeltuin de Speeldernis – giving children the opportunity for unstructured play. Kids can enjoy the biodiversity of “wild” space, build dens, fires and rafts, and camp out. It now draws 35,000 visitors a year.
In Albania, children are the greatest value for the people. Taking this into account, the local government of Tirana considers the importance of future generations as a priority issue. First of all, they have changed the narrative of the city administration. Usually, in politics, they always worry about the next election. So they could take the conversation to the next level – how do we worry about the next generation, rather than just the next election?
The Smart Cities Information System (SCIS) is a knowledge platform to exchange data, experience and know-how and to collaborate on the creation of smart cities, providing a high quality of life for its citizens in a clean, energy efficient and climate friendly urban environment. SCIS brings together project developers, cities, research institutions, industry, experts and citizens from across Europe. SCIS focuses on people and their stories – bringing to life best practices and lessons learned from smart projects.
PLANHEAT will develop and validate an integrated and easy-to-use tool to support local authorities in selecting, simulating and comparing alternative low carbon and economically sustainable scenarios for heating and cooling. It will be validated in the three PLANHEAT cities.
The Bee Path was opened in 2015 by the city of Ljubljana (SI), a municipality aware of the importance of pollinators for the sustainability of cities. The path is designed in such a way that visitors can comprehend the importance of bees for our survival and our food safety, discover the necessity of honey in our daily diet, but also find out more about the city's beekeeping culture. Various stakeholders are involved in the initiative: educational, cultural and health institutions, businesses, NGOs, and of course, beekeepers.
The overarching theme of this good practice is strategic management in the context of long-term decline and stagnation. After local industries closed, the population of Altena (DE) shrank by 43% between 1975 and 2014. Facing diminishing resources and increasingly complex problems, Altena shifted its strategic objectives to focus on controlling decline rather than growth. The municipality adjusted its priorities, working more closely with citizens.
The Urban Data Platform is a joint initiative of the Directorate General Joint Research Centre (DG JRC) and the Directorate General for Regional and Urban Policy (DG REGIO) of the European Commission. It aims to provide access to information on the status and trends of European cities and their surrounding regions. The cities currently included in the Urban Data Platform correspond to the EU-OECD definition ‘A city is a local administrative unit where the majority of the population lives in an urban centre of at least 50 000 inhabitants’.