Completed Interreg projects

Brighton & Hove City Council has taken part in a number of projects through the different strands of the Interreg programme. Here are a few which have been completed in the past few years.

BUFU - Building Futures - Interreg IVa Two Seas Programme

The BUFU project was devised in partnership with City College Brighton & Hove, Maison de l’Initiative in Grande Synthe and Entreprendre Enseble in Dunkirk, France  to support workless residents in both countries. This project saw the establishment of a local employment scheme for the city which obliged developers to notify their job vacancies to Building Futures and make employment and training places available for workless residents.

The council’s Economic Development and Planning teams worked with project partners to develop legislation to ensure that the obligation could be enforced in law and signed by the developer prior to the commencement of a development.

The council’s children's services identified clients for the programme, and provided on–going support for the client on the Building Futures programme. The City College ran taster courses and a 10-week training programme in construction including a week of work placements for the clients registered in the scheme.

The learning with the region of Dunkirk looked at how they have successfully negotiated agreements with employers in recruiting unemployed and/or low skilled workers; how employers had been encouraged to participate in providing work experience; how agreements could be negotiated in periods of economic downturn; how they can be monitored to ensure equality of access; and how residents with skills are matched to employment sites.

The BUFU project was valued at £1.5m and brought in around  £896k to the city of Brighton & Hove. It started in June 2010 and closed at the end of 2012.

White Night Interreg IVA Channel Programme

The White Night project involved the development of a night time festival to explore the culture of the city at night, improve the night time economy and strengthen social cohesion. Following the footsteps of the concept initiated by Paris, a "White Night" was organised each year in October on each side of the Channel (Brighton & Hove and Amiens), offering art performances, concerts and exhibitions taking place in significant urban venues. Anglo-French cooperation included exchange visits of artists to the two festivals.

MMOVE Interreg IVC

MMOVE (Mobility Management Over Europe) was an Interreg IVC project which aimed to influence regional policy-making by providing best practice solutions to help cities make the best use of their infrastructure and services in the area of traffic management. The MMOVE project formally came to an end on 31 January 2012. The project had 11 partners and funded:

Identifying and exchanging best practices, for example encouraging alternative means of transport and intelligent transport systems.

Study visits looking at best practices relating to a/communication and awareness campaigns; b/ parking traffic control measures c/ collective and public transport measures.

Transferability assessment reports in order to identify critical success factors. Each partner can assess the transferability of one good practice from their city.

Improving awareness of cheap and effective mobility management methods.

The 11 partners were:

• Reggio Emilia (Lead partner), Marche Region (Italy)
• Brighton & Hove (UK)
• Girona (Spain)
• Molndal, Varberg (Sweden)
• Ulm (Germany)
• Kavala, Volos (Greece)
• Brasov (Romania)
• Razlog (Bulgaria)

The main output in the last semester for Brighton & Hove was the production by Sustrans of a Bicibus Transferability report looking at how we might introduce the Reggio Emilia cycle train concept to Brighton & Hove, and more generally, the conditions necessary to organise a successful cycle train.

The Bicibus had been put forward as one example of best practice by our Italian partner city Regio Emilia.  The Bicibus or ‘cycling bus’ encourages and assists children to cycle to and from school. It works in a similar way to walking buses used at some Brighton & Hove schools with a set cycle route with regular pick up points where children can join at specific times. Once they’ve joined Bicibus, children ride to and from school together under the supervision of adult cyclists.

The Interreg IVC programme is an European Union programme funded through DG Regio that helps regions of Europe work together to share their knowledge and experience.  

CAPTURE project Interreg IIIC

The project aimed to use the network to help optimise business innovation, growth and regional economic development and stimulate knowledge-based companies to help create higher value jobs. The project , which was managed by Brighton & Hove City Council, finished in December 2007,  and had a total budget of €587,800 partially funded through ERDF money.

There were eight study visits in the project, more than the six originally planned, as these proved more popular than the staff exchanges. The first study visit was held in Brighton & Hove on 30 November 2005 and  the others were in Vigo in Spain, Jyvaskyla in Finland, Kavala in Greece, Girona in Spain,  Heraklion in Greece, Klaipeda in Lithuania and the last one, an IT Incubation Masterclass in Trinec, Czech Republic in May 2007. The final dissemination event took place in Brussels on 16-17 October 2007.

Wel_hops: Welfare Housing policies for Senior Citizens Interreg IIIC

Wel_hops was an Interreg IIIC project aimed at promoting independent living and improved housing conditions for older people across Europe through improved housing design. Brighton & Hove was the UK partner in this project. The lead partner was the Emilia Romagna Economic Development Agency in Italy and the project also included partners from Sweden, Hungary and Spain.

The project ran until 2007 and produced a good practice guide on accessible housing design focused on older people. A dvd and cd-rom accompanies the guide which is free of charge from the Housing strategy department or by phoning (01273) 293055.

More information is on the council's main Wel_hops page.