City Minded

Background

Sustainability of cities is a key challenge in Europe: nowadays, around 70% of Europeans live in cities and this number will rise, therefore urban areas are the most important test-bed for energy transition and decarbonisation models. Decarbonisation measures concern a wide variety of topics; therefore, their planning requires a systemic interdisciplinary approach that involves different stakeholders.
In previous Erasmus projects such as EH-Cmap, ENEPLAN and E-RESPLAN project partners have put into practice holistic approach, which resulted in interdisciplinary intellectual outputs. Building on the results of the FP7 City-Zen project, by using systemic interdisciplinary approach, the project intends to develop and test an innovative, creative, European-scaled learning environment called ‘city decarbonisation itinerant workshop’, where students, specialists and stakeholders can come together to address common onsite challenges and define collaborative urban decarbonisation roadmaps through a ‘learning-by-doing’ method.
Title: CITY MINDED
City Monitoring and Integrated Design for Decarbonisation
Funding program:
Erasmus+
Timeframe:
31/12/2019 – 31/12/2022
(36 Months)

Objectives

The project plans to achieve a series of specific objectives, including:
  • The definition of a common methodology to guide project implementation that will be shared within the partnership during a dedicated Teachers training workshop;
  • A series of 3 local workshops, touching different target cities (Seville, Siena, Roma), each one involving HEI students from the hosting partner university, experts from partner organisation and local stakeholders in the drafting of city decarbonisation roadmaps for target neighbourhoods/districts;
  • The fine-tuning and integration of the project methodology according to the workshops results, and the creation of a modular online course on urban decarbonisation collecting and organizing the OERs and the educational materials produced during the project;
  • The realization of an open web-based platform where the online course and the other materials produced during the project will be freely accessible to students and professors for further exploitation;
  • A 2-weeks’ Intensive Course in Malta where students and teachers/trainers will put into practice the final methodology and OERs and draft a sustainable development agenda for a target area in the city of Valletta (Malta).
Students involved in the city decarbonisation itinerant workshop and in the Intensive Course will acquire/improve their soft skills and trans-disciplinary competences, resulting in increased employability in both the public and the private sector.
Local stakeholders (public sector, private enterprises, business support organizations and NGOs) and citizens participating in the workshops will gain awareness on urban sustainability issues and get an insight on planning processes.
Long-term scope of the project is to improve cooperation and share knowledge to manage energy transition and pursue decarbonisation of European cities, combining multidisciplinary competences. The teaching/learning experiences implemented and materials provided in open access are therefore expected to allow for building capacity of new professional figures able to manage this urgent and necessary transition to carbon neutrality.

Project partners

LP1 – IRENA (HR)
PP1 – UNISI (IT)
PP2 – UNIROMA3 (IT)
PP3 – Universidad Pablo de Olavide (E)
PP4 – MIEMA (M)