Project summary

Urban centres and their metropolitan regions are facing major challenges both globally and in Europe. Urbanisation, accompanied by the ever-increasing effects of climate change and a drastic shortage of resources, especially fossil fuels, while consumption continues to rise, and the creation of affordable, multifunctional, economical and functional living space are just some of the major challenges. The cities and regions of Europe are challenged by these developments and are looking for support in partnership structures. The City of Vienna already has an excellent reputation, not least due to all its international activities to date, and has developed solutions in the areas of services of general interest (energy, water supply, wastewater, waste disposal, education, culture, health and social services, local public transport), as well as in housing and ICT, or has set itself the goal of developing innovative solutions.

Based on this, the administrative objective has the following goals:

• Strengthening the existing international offices as local service and contact centres, especially for EU funding;
• Improved utilisation of existing resources of the City of Vienna and Wien Holding;
• Positioning the City of Vienna as THE innovative cooperation partner in Europe;
• Establishment of binding partnerships, especially for EU-funded projects;
• Development of eligible projects;
• Realisation of EU-funded research and implementation projects.

Results and impact

Vienna can serve as a provider of expertise in services of general interest, but at the same time there is always a need for action and development in order to continue to meet the growing demands. Cooperation and knowledge partnerships with other European metropolises are of enormous importance, not least in order to benefit from EU funding. The following aspects take centre stage:

• goal-oriented: formulating and visualising a common vision and goals;
• multi- and interdisciplinary: stakeholders from politics, administration and companies must be integrated into processes;
• participatory: jointly developing innovative solutions through research and development;
• shared learning: continuous learning in the team / city partnership through the exchange of knowledge and experience;
• open: open innovation, open data: exchange knowledge and be open to new ideas;
• transferable: the transfer of innovative solutions to other cities and regions is of great importance;
• sustainable: the solutions developed are sustainable and contribute to overcoming current and future challenges, e.g. adapting to climate change.