Lively Cities take flight

After its kick off in March 2011, INTERREG IVB project Lively Cities starts now the pilot tests stage until the end of 2012.

It's about fifteen spaces in Belgium, France, the Netherlands and United Kingdom which have been sift trought. Counting, public consultations, surveys, on site interviews, SWOT analyses (Strength, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats)... led by partners together & separately, allow us to create a profile of eash public space in order to define their positionning and identity.

The first stage of the project, which lasted until December 2011, aimed to take stock of each space, but also to develop a common methodology for all partners to implement ULP and their structures for managing space on the long term. It has been done and everyone, from those transnational bases, can adapt to its own space technology developed during various meeting which, in 2011, have revealed the different Lively Cities' workspaces.

2012, will be the year of the second stage : test. Test a series of pilot projects on various areas of the partners. Thanks to this year "laboratory", Lively Cities may study, assess and see on the field what's working, what's not and what can be improved. The choice about pilot tests was defined from the 'bottom-up" approach led since the beginning of the project to the different users' communities. Pilot tests are the results of the desire of potential spaces' users. Thus, moveable furniture, public art, free wifi, outdoor bookshop, streetfood, works on noise and smell, participative workshop, communities' activities, alternative grounds, are so many possibilities for the future.

Let's see what will be really adopted by the real spaces' users!