City center news

PORTUGAL – Book Fair: a way to enhance the revitalization of Coimbra’s City Center

The Municipality of Coimbra is developing and implementing a strategy to revitalize the historic city center, organizing dynamic and attractive cultural events for all age groups and different audiences. The aim is to attract the city’s inhabitants and visitors to the “heart of the city”, creating new economic, social, and cultural dynamics in a unique … Read more

SPAIN – Valencia makes street crossing safer for everyone!

Pedestrian crossings are usually more dangerous than other spots of the urban environment for pedestrians. To tackle this issue, the Spanish citiy of Valencia used high and low-tech technologies to secure them.   On the one hand, Valencia City Council focus on improving pedestrian crossing for people with functional diversity, such as people with autism spectrum … Read more

GERMANY –  Introducing the €9-a-month unlimited public transport ticket!

Last week, the German parliament approved a bill introducing a €9-a-month ticket scheme for all city and regional transport modes. Inspired by the Austrian “Klimaticket” introduced last year, the measure aims to encourage the use of public transportation instead of cars. First introduced to face the current living cost crisis and save energy in the … Read more

FRANCE – Brest, the unexpected colorful city!

In 2018, the city of Brest launched a unique project in France: “Objectif Couleurs“. This device encourages residents to repaint the facade of their houses with bright colors. This scheme is the result of a grassroots process. Indeed, in the 1990s and 2000s, the local association of the Loucheur neighborhood decided to repaint their facades … Read more

PORTUGAL – Braga reward cycling

The benefits of cycling are now not to be proven: exercise, health, traffic, accessibility for all public, quality of life, or noise. Yet despite the beautiful weather conditions, Portuguese cities can have trouble convincing drivers to trade their cars for a bike. Thus the city of Braga, alongside Istanbul (Turkey) and Tallinn (Estonia), took the … Read more

CYPRUS – A shared garden to empower local communities in Nicosia

In the heart of the Cypriot capital city lies a peaceful community garden. The story goes that in October 2019, an energetic team called Gardens of the Future presented their project and won the Climathon Nicosia Concours. This award kickstarted the project to makegarden reality. With the help of hundreds of volunteers, the derelict space … Read more

HUNGARY – Budapest, the playground for low carbon mobilities

In Hungary, the transport sector accounts for 20% of CO2 emissions. To tackle this issue on a national level, the National Hydrogen Strategy was adopted last June to push the adoption of this new technology. It encompasses the rapid extension of the production capacities, the creation of 40 filling points, and the purchase of almost … Read more

IRELAND – Drogheda highlights Irish mythology through street art

Situated 60km away from Dublin, the town of Drogheda has seen in the past years an increase in population, boosted by the Covid pandemic and subsequent move of Dubliners looking for more space. Thus the municipality aims to reconnect the newcomers and already inhabitants to their town through culture. In this framework, officials unveiled the … Read more

AUSTRIA/BULGARIA – Two ways to involve citizens in the energy transition!

Switching their energy supply to renewables is central for municipalities to reach their carbon emissions goals. Being one of the most local green energy makes photovoltaic particularly easy to get city dwellers involved. Thus Dornbirn in Austria (50 000 inhabitants) and Burgas in Bulgaria (200 000 inhabitants) are taking two different but complementary paths to … Read more


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*This event is not organized by the French Government. However we have been allowed by the French Government to use the emblem of the French Presidency of the Council of the European Union.