New Ideas for Old Buildings

EXPEDITIO is partner in the European project "New Ideas for Old Buildings". Project is implemented by seven small and medium sized European towns from the Baltic to the Balkans, which are facing the common problems of economic and social decline and are motivated to find efficient and democratic solutions for revitalising their towns and enhancing the quality of life of their inhabitants.

The project will be lead by Municipality of Ajdovscina, which has already successfully tackled the issue of empty public buildings by revitalising and reconstructing old military premises into multifunctional youth centre, public library, university branch, municipal administration office and a number of sports facilities.

Through the exchange of good practice, experience and expertise of involved municipalities and partner NGOs, the project aims to:

- increase involvement of citizens in decision-making of public property management and sustainable urban development
- identify concrete solutions to better utilize public property in partner cities
- develop a long-term experience-based platform for public property management in medium and small European towns

As there are around 8,414 small and medium sized towns in the EU, representing almost a quarter (24.2%) of the European urban population, the network is well placed to disseminate its best practice and gained experience Europewide in order to motivate other towns to participate in the network and to further participatory revitalisation of similar cities.

The project will result in:

- establishment and strengthening of a sustainable cooperation network
- exchange of good practice between networked towns
- development of common guidelines on how to utilise public property better integrated with public participation
- formulation of 7 action plans on how to revitalise public property through concrete projects and joint initiatives of local and European partners.

Municipality Ajdovscina (Slovenia) is lead partner on this project, other partners are: Institut for Spatial Politics - IPOP (Slovenia), Kitev - Kultur im Turm Oberhausen (Germany), Mikro Art (Serbia), Local community Maribor (Slovenia), Municipality of Niksic (Montenegro), Stadt Oberhausen (Germany), Urban Institute (Latvia), Association Green Istria (Croatia) and Expeditio (Montenegro).

Proect is implemented within Europe for Citizens programmme. It started in July 2015 and will last till the end of June 2017.