INTELCITIES is an integrated RTD project funded from EU FP6 through the IST Programme that brings together 18 cities, led by Manchester and Siena, with 20 ICT companies including Nokia, Microsoft and CISCO and 36 research groups to pool advanced knowledge and experience of electronic government, planning systems and citizen participation from across Europe. It will help achieve the EU policy goal of the "Knowledge Society" by 2010 through new forms of electronic governance of cities and greater social inclusion through enhanced access to services by citizens and businesses.

The project is based on the "Intelligent City" and "e-Agora" vision and research strategy emergent from the EU FP5 INTELCITY roadmap project (IST-2001-37373), which developed consensus between the research community, cities and ICT companies over research priorities and direction in seeking to deliver the joint EU objectives of the "Knowledge Society" and "Sustainable Development".

INTELCITIES' objective is to create a new and innovative set of interoperable e-government services to meet the needs of both citizens and businesses. This will provide interactive citywide on-line applications and services for users that will make all aspects of what is "going-on" in the city available to everyone. This will support:

1. Everyday needs and requirements of citizens and business through 24 hour access to transactional city services;
2. More efficient city management and administration by integrating functions and services across city authorities, regional and national governmental agencies, utility and transport system providers and citizens/ NGO networks;
3. Much more innovative and effective approaches to urban planning through more reliable city modeling, using advanced visualization and predictive techniques, which will enable citizens and businesses to play a far more participative and inclusive role in influencing how planned changes in the city will affect their lives.

INTELCITIES is coordinated by the City of Manchester supported by the internationally renowned Institute of the Built and Human Environment at Salford University.

Among the 89, ITAS is one of the 16 lead project partners heading the "e-Governance"  Workpackage. The effort constitutes a core part of the INTELCITIES Activity area D: "e-Governance Development and Innovation". It aims at the development of a multi-dimensional and multi-actor "City e-Governance Policy Model" to facilitate an enhanced role and contribution of ICTs to the achievement of 'Good Governance' principles and goals in European urban decision-making in context of the Sustainable Knowledge Society. The Model will specify the requirements of the e-Governance processes and structures involving effective and participatory interactions, relationships, and networks of local government and the local actors in city electronic administration, planning and management. This holistic approach of governing and policy will build on leading evidence from existing e-Governance "Best Practices" worldwide and the experiences and successes of the INTELCITIES participating cities.

The "e-Governance" team involves 14 research, technology and city partners among which leading are Forsebäck IT & Euro Intelligence, Sweden; Systema Technologies S.A., Greece; NetU Consultants, Cyprus; GoPro Reykjavik, Iceland, Venice International University, Italy; University of Cyprus and the cities of Reykjavik, Athens, and Venice. Two other cities - Karlsruhe, Germany and Linz, Austria have also committed to support the work as part of the Project's Reference Group.

• More on Intelcities in an article by Krassimira Paskaleva-Shapira in Technikfolgenabschätzung - Theorie und Praxis 13(2004)1 here
• For further information on this project http://www.intelcitiesproject.com
• Special information on the WP11 ‚Urban Governance of Cultural Tourism in Europe’, lead by ITAS, is available on the WP11 website http://intelcities.iti.gr