20 August 2007 - ECOTEC/ECORYS has prepared the first State of European Cities Report, jointly with Nordregio and Eurofutures. The report - prepared for the European Commission DG Regio - takes stock of the situation and developments in urban areas in Europe in the period 1996 to 2001, and provides a basis for subsequent comparisons.

It does so by examining developments in urban areas at different levels (core cities, larger urban zones and neighbourhoods), while taking into account regional and national contexts. When cities seek to understand the changes around them and look for strategic re-orientation, this report provides a reference point, which can help them to identify their unique characteristics, as well as their commonalities with other European urban areas.

This State of the European Cities report is based on the Urban Audit, which allows 258 cities in the EU to be compared for the first time. The resulting data set allows objective comparisons to be made between the cities included from across Europe, in the fields of demography, social conditions, economic aspects, education, civic involvement, environment, transport and culture. The present report has sought to exploit the wide range of data gathered by the Urban Audit as far as possible. It draws on key elements of the data set in chapters on population change, urban competitiveness, living conditions and the administrative power of cities.

The Report has been launched by the European Commission DG Regio on Friday 27th July.
Click here for the EU press release.

For more information:
ECORYS Brussels
Jan Maarten de Vet
T +32 (2) 743 85 64
E This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it