Košice 2.0

Košice 2.0 project is being implemented thanks to the European Commission’s Urban Innovative Actions Initiative (UIA). The aim is to support innovative and experimental sustainable urban development projects to the extent that their cities would not normally fund them. Košice became the first city in Slovakia to succeed in the open call.

The Košice 2.0 project aims to create a creative ecosystem in which individual stakeholders (local government, citizens, businesses) coexist, cooperate, and make informed decisions to improve the city’s quality of life. As such, these are the main goals:

• improve the quality of life in the city through the improvement and development of urban services,
• increase civic engagement in cultural, social, and economic activities,
• develop the cultural and creative industries and education to create new jobs.

There are three interrelated challenges for the Košice 2.0 project:

• make full use of the potential offered by cross-sectoral cooperation between the creative industries and ICT,
• transform economically from an industrial city to a digital and creative city,
• address the issue of low civic engagement and trust in public institutions.

Košice 2.0 – a city with a clear vision for ​​its development through the improvement and innovation of urban services, the involvement of citizens in its activities, the creation of opportunities for cooperation, and the development of the IT and creative industries.

The role of the Citizen Experience and Well-being Institute or CX Institute is to identify, analyze, and redesign the city’s services individually or together with other entities. The CX Institute identifies the city’s services, how they are provided to citizens, their quality and collects and evaluates data used to create local policies and strategies. The CX Institute also takes part in creating an Open Data Platform.

“Our organization is the content leader of the project activities. The CX Institute will become part of CIKE’s organizational structure. We will also create a Mobile Urban Lab (MUL) to collect data directly in public space, work with citizens, and process their inputs. CIKE will participate in the creation of media artworks in public space. We will help with the innovation programs and build on our experience with education and professionalization. We consider the focus on well-being and quality of life to be the most important part of the project, combining digital technologies, art, and creativity in the process. Thus, we are directly fulfilling our mission in the UNESCO Creative Cities Network of which the city of Košice has been a part of since 2017.” – Michal Hladký, Director of Creative Industry Košice

The Mobile Urban Lab (MUL) is a research unit – a contact point between the CX Institute and citizens. MUL is a car equipped with modern digital technologies, displays, and sensors, and it is used for:

• mapping of public space, in particular unused spaces in the city,
• data presentation using VR, AR, and other modern technologies,
• identification of needs and communication with the inhabitants of the city, which enables them to participate in the identification of urban challenges through events, discussions, questionnaires,
• implementation of art interventions in public space.

The Košice 2.0 project creates opportunities to solve urban challenges for startups, entrepreneurs, non-governmental organizations, and professionals from the field of IT and the creative industries, as well as active local citizens.

The Bravo building in Kasárne/Kulturpark complex will become home to creative innovators, startups. FabLab, Audiovisual center, Meetup & Community space, and a Co-working space will all be located here.

The educational programs aim to build capacities at the level of local government, academia, and the general public.

Artistic interventions and media art installations are a means of establishing a dialogue with the city’s inhabitants, obtaining data for research carried out by the CX Institute, and actively interacting with the urban environment.

This project is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund through the Urban Innovative Actions Initiative.