About: urban policy
City leader: Europe must simplify rules to help cities become more resilient
Europe is moving in the right direction in helping its cities become more resilient and sustainable, but the EU must streamline its myriad regulations and requirements to move the process along, the leader of an international NGO pioneered by the...
Lisbon, Malmö and Skopje announced as sustainable mobility city finalists
Cities from Portugal, Sweden and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia have made it through to become finalists for the European Mobility Award 2016.
Jeremy Rifkin: ‘What’s missing from UN climate talks is a new economic vision’
The UN climate change summit (COP21), which opens in Paris next week, “will be meaningless” if it doesn’t include a positive agenda for economic growth, warns Jeremy Rifkin.
High time for an EU Urban Agenda
Bas Verkerk is the mayor of the Dutch city of Delft and the president of the ALDE Group in the Committee of the Regions (CoR). He is rapporteur of the CoR opinion on 'An integrated Urban Agenda for the EU'.
EU public transport could learn from Bogotá, road lobby suggests
SPECIAL REPORT / The road transport lobby is casting admiring glances at Bogotá’s rapid bus transit system as it looks to vastly increase the number of people using public transport in the EU by 2025.
Belgium makes place for urban enterprises
The city of Liège in the south-east of Belgium is making place for small businesses to grow their activities as part of a long-term strategy to revive the economic life of urban areas, using money from the EU.
Parliament demands ‘result-oriented’ regional policy
Echoing Regional Policy Commissioner Johannes Hahn, the European Parliament said the EU should take steps to ensure that regional policy is more results-oriented so that EU funds are spent more efficiently and effectively, with a clear focus on supporting sustainable economic growth, especially in urban areas.
Author: ‘Talent, technology and tolerance’ key to attracting creative workers
A leading thinker on creativity believes attracting talented people is the driving force behind successful cities. In an interview with EURACTIV, Richard Florida, author of 'The Rise of the Creative Class', said European countries are battling to attract and retain innovative people.
‘Talent, technology and tolerance’ key to attracting creative workers
A leading thinker on creativity believes attracting talented people is the driving force behind successful cities. In an interview with EURACTIV, Richard Florida, author of 'The Rise of the Creative Class', said European countries are battling to attract and retain innovative people.
Cities and climate change
Home to 80% of EU citizens and 70% of greenhouse gas emissions, urban areas play a key role in fighting climate change; but cities' access to funding for green policies is proving a major stumbling block.
Sustainable Cities
The climate change imperative has put the spotlight on Europe's cities, which are home to 80% of Europeans and consume a disproportionate share of natural resources relative to their surface area.
EU audit shows big disparities in quality of city life
The results of an urban audit measuring everything from housing and health to crime, climate and the recycling of waste reveal large disparities in the quality of urban life across Europe and indicate possible priorities for future EU cohesion policy funding.
MEP Beaupuy: EU efforts to limit urban sprawl ‘non-existent’
French Liberal Democrat MEP Jean Marie Beaupuy, Chair of Parliament's Intergroup on Urban Housing, spoke with EURACTIV on 17 October during a seminar organised by the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) on the issue of urban sprawl in Europe. Jean Marie Beaupuy is a member of the Alliance of Liberal Democrats (ALDE) in the European Parliament.
WHO: Urban planning should promote active lifestyle
As obesity rates in Europe increase, the World Health Organization (WHO) deplores that only a few residential environment currently meet the recommended criteria to promote an active lifestyle.The future of the world is urban
60% of the world's population will live in cities by 2030, states Tobias Just in a recent research paper for Deutsche Bank.
Cities ‘key’ to solving world’s environmental woes
With 80% of Europeans living in urban areas, cities hold the key to sustainable development, said Commissioner Margot Wallström, outlining her "vision" for sustainable cities at the opening session of Brussels’ Green Week event.
EU ministers outline ‘European City’ ideal
The Leipzig Charter on Sustainable European Cities, signed by European ministers on 24 May, lays the foundation for a new integrated urban policy in Europe, focusing on helping cities tackle problems of social exclusion, structural change, ageing, climate change and mobility.
Interview: ‘EU not doing enough on public transport’
MEP Gyula Hegyi, who has drafted a Parliament Report on the EU urban environment strategy, says in an interview with EURACTIV that improving mobility should be cities' number-one priority and that the EU must do more to encourage this.