With a population of 377 587 people and 12 million tourists per year, Florence is not only a place with an impressive artistic heritage and literary history, beautiful landscapes, high-quality fashion and lifestyle, agricultural and gastronomy products, but it also has efficient digital public services, high-level industries in innovation and technology, and excellent training institutes.
The city of Aachen has 248 000 inhabitants and is situated at the western border of Germany with Belgium and the Netherlands. The district Aachen-North, which is the focus of the EU-GUGLE project, is a heterogeneous area with a mixture of recent and old industrial and residential buildings. It is spread over 300 hectares and has 15 500 inhabitants. The urban planning focuses on revitalising and improving the attractiveness of the district.
Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia and the country’s largest city with a population of about 475 000. Located in south-western Slovakia, the city occupies both banks of the Danube River (centre of the city) and the left bank of the Morava River (west part of the city).
Milan, the second-largest city in Italy and the capital of Lombardy has a population of about 1.35 million people. The area included as the Italian demonstrator of the EU-GUGLE project us called Zona 4 and is one of the nine administrative districts of Milan, located at the southeast border. With a surface of about 21 km2 the district has a population of 152 300 inhabitants. The project covers public residential buildings used for social housing and one public school.
Located 11 km from Bilbao, Sestao is a municipality with a strong post-industrial character. It has an area of 3.5 km2 where only 0.9 km2 are devoted to residential use and the rest is used for industrial purposes.
Tampere is located on the banks of the Tammerkoski rapids, between two lakes, Näsijärvi and Pyhäjärvi. It is the third biggest city in Finland, and the biggest inland city in the Nordic countries with 215 168 inhabitants.
The EU-GUGLE demonstration district in Vienna is named Penzing or the 14th district. The smart Viennese gate to western Austria and to the Natura 2000 area – the Biosphärenpark Wienerwald – covers about 3374 hectares with an open area covering 60 %, including parts of the forest surrounding Vienna. The district has about 84 362 inhabitants, predominantly between 40 and 50 years of age.
The R2CITIES implementation site in Genoa is the social housing district of Lavatrici, developed between 1980 and 1990. Located in the west part of the city, the site consists of more than 500 dwellings. It is divided into four main blocks, each of which is composed of three different buildings – a high block, a lower block, and a centre block of apartments. The complex has one common area, ample parking and is served by a public bus line.
The Yakacik neighbourhood in the Kartal district in Istanbul is one of the selected pilot sites for the R2CITIES project. The implementation area is located between the Sea of Marmara to the south and the TEM motorways to the north. Despite being far from the city centre it is one of the best-connected parts of Istanbul with motorways, ferries, suburban railways and metro. The presence of the International Sabiha Gökçen Airport, Formula 1 track and Sabancı University contribute to the economic structure of the area, together with small-scale commerce and manufacturing.
A complete retrofit based on facade improvements, ICT and renewable energy systems is being implemented in the Cuatro de Marzo district, the demo site chosen for the R2CITIES project in Valladolid.
