Innovation can be encouraged in many ways. One example is to cooperate with local university as the port of Montreal (Canada) is doing with ÉTS École de technologie supérieure. The port just launched the 6th Smart Port Challenge, in which the best students’ team to design a truck entry complex for the new port expansion project will earn $10, 000 in scholarships. Another option is to establish strategic partnerships, as the port of Leixões is doing with NOS, a leading telecommunication company. The agreement will transform Leixões into the first 5G port in Portugal, for example, allowing the use of drones to monitor risk manoeuvres in real time. Other cases, like Hamburg (Germany), are developing innovation campus, such as homePORT, that will allow port stakeholders to test and develop new technologies. During the next Port & City Days in Brussels we will host a roundtable focusing on port city innovation ecosystems.

The port city of Valencia (Spain) wants to become an energy transition hub. The Municipality, Regional government, Valencia Port Foundation and University have launched the H2VLC program – Valencia Green Hydrogen Valley, to promote green hydrogen in the logistics and transport sectors. The project, involving more than 30 companies and 5 research centres, will mobilise more than 160 million € for 21 projects, including new infrastructures for green hydrogen or the acquisition of urban and industrial logistics transport vehicles powered by green hydrogen. In the meantime, the port will install a hydrogen supply station in January and has launched an open innovation challenge to get energy from renewable sources, initiatives connected to the H2Ports and Blue Deal projects respectively. The energy transition will be the topic of the high-level roundtable of the AIVP Port & City Days in Brussels.

The City of Buenos Aires has been distinguished for the Parques del Bajo project, developed by AIVP member, Corporación Puerto Madero (CPM). The jury of the Gubbio Award highlighted the Urban Memory presented by CPM for the project that completes the strategic urban operation of Paseo del Bajo and Puerto Madero’s plan. This project consolidates the articulation between the city and the river, with emphasis on the civic-historic axis. The historical restitution of public green spaces carries great emblematic value due to their proximity to the city’s Central Area. We have highlighted this project as a good practice for sustainable mobility, and discussed it several times in interviews with CPM and the Port of Buenos Aires.

This new public space will combine the site’s maritime heritage with green spaces to promote biodiversity. The stated aim is to achieve environmental excellence and obtain “One Planet Living” accreditation. The project is part of the Port of Belfast’s target of achieving carbon neutrality by 2030. It is being developed in collaboration with the City of Belfast and the Maritime Belfast Trust. A public consultation has also been launched.

Halls 4 and 5 have housed the School of Fine Arts since 2017. A university centre dedicated to Digital Culture also opened in 2019, in Hall 6. Three labs (Manufacturing Lab, Experience Lab, Digital Learning Lab) were officially opened there in September. The eastern part of Hall 6 is also occupied by a business centre for creative and digital industries. Having been disrupted by the health crisis, redevelopment work on Halls 1 and 2 has now resumed. A Food Hall housing around a dozen dining areas is also set open in the summer of 2022, while the Creative Factory is due to open for cultural and creative industries by the end of 2022.