The CCID’s CEO, Tasso Evangelinos, will this month take part in the 2018 World Towns Leadership Summit in Berlin, Germany. The summit is aimed at exploring the future roles of urban place management organisations in the smart city movement.
Held from 18 to 20 June, the 2018 summit, organised by the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce and the International Downtown Association (IDA) will focus on a deeper deliberation into economic development opportunities, the first of the four principles established during the inaugural summit in Edinburgh, Scotland and continued in Malmö, Sweden in 2017. The other three principles on the role of towns and urban districts are the unique identities of place, governance and citizenship and reducing the environmental footprint.
Within the context of smart cities, the summit will identify the role of Business Improvement Districts (BIDs) or City Improvement Districts (CIDs) as they are known locally and other public-private partnership organisations as drivers of economic growth while also exploring finance options to support innovative city building. In addition, during the summit, placemaking professionals from over ten countries will share their experiences and lend their expertise to the deliberations, while participants will also experience study visits of key projects in Berlin and Hamburg.
According to the website for the non-profit organisation, Project for Public Spaces (PPS), placemaking inspires people to collectively reimagine and reinvent public spaces as the heart of every community. It’s about strengthening the connection between people and the places they share.
Having attended the second World Towns Leadership Summit in Sweden last year, Tasso says he is looking forward to another robust and hands-on summit with key role players in the smart city movement.
“The reality is that more and more people are moving into cities. It has been said that, in the next 20 years, we will see more than two billion more people moving to urban areas. However, there has been a lack of collaboration between the public and private sector around city development. A summit such as this one bridges that gap as it focuses on how we need to think about what cities will look in the years to come, and prompts us to come up with a global strategy to deliver services effectively, identify the key skills that will be required to do this and deal with the challenges that come with growing cities.
“The summit is also about showcasing, selling and promoting the Cape Town Central City. We’ve come a long way from the ‘crime and grime’ scenario that our CBD had fallen into by the late 1990s. There’s an interest internationally in what we have done to become a vibrant CBD for investment, and a world-class live, work, play and stay destination that is welcoming to all. Ultimately, it’s about networking, engaging and being connected to world trends regarding city management, and I look forward to sharing some of the lessons learnt from our colleagues abroad as we continue to strive for a Central City that is safe, clean, caring, open for business and a centre for all.”
Image by World Towns Leadership Summit