Limerick continues to build alliances across Europe

  • European Week of Regions and Cities 2020

Limerick has continued to build alliances across Europe as part of the series of events to mark European Week of Regions and Cities. It sees national and regional bodies come together with citizen organisations and businesses to share their ideas on growth and job creation, as well as demonstrating how to implement European Union cohesion policy.

This year the focus was on building a green, digital economy in a European way, which leaves no region behind, the European Green Deal and the opportunity it presents to deliver a sustainable economic recovery post Covid.

Limerick City and County Council co-organised two sessions at this year’s event with presentations by Chief Executive Dr Pat Daly and Senior Executive Planner Kieran Reeves as part of European Week of Regions and Cities.

The first session was a workshop on how to implement and monitor the UN Sustainable Development Goals, organised with the European Commission DG REGIO, and the European Commission Joint Research Centre. A discussion on the Limerick Bold City Vision being developed as part of the Horizon 2020 funded +CityxChange (Positive City Exchange) project took place and how the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals provide the basis for developing this vision and how they align with the Limerick Development Plan. You can watch a playback of this workshop here.

The second session was on Green Cities by Co-Design, organised in conjunction with the Irish Regions European Office, our GoGreen Routes partner Versailles, and our joint European Green Leaf 2020 Award winner the Belgian city of Mechelen.

Part of the discussion centred on how Limerick has come up with new ways of designing and planning our development, with the aim of being a sustainable smart city, while working in conjunction with local organisations and businesses to co-create our policies.

It focused on how engagement should be done to connect the European level to the local level, to involve our MEP’s directly in European Projects so they can be a part of the progress that is happening on the ground. You can watch a playback of this workshop here.

Terry Connolly, EU Programmes Manager, Limerick City and County Council said: “The European Week of Regions and Cities is a great way to showcase the achievements of Limerick. The virtual environment worked well and enabled us to be there with our European partners so we can learn from each other and swap experiences on the best ways to move forward to a more sustainable future”.

“Limerick’s involvement in organising these workshops is an example of how the Council’s work is in alignment with Horizon Europe’s mission on Climate-Neutral and Smart cities. We will continue to build alliances to take full advantage of the opportunities being presented through the European Green deal, particularly around the renovation wave, cleaner transport and logistics, and the digital transition.”

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