Working with city partners, we successfully applied to join to the Rockefeller Foundation’s 100 Resilience Cities – a global programme that supports cities to become more resilient to the physical, social and economic challenges of the 21st century.

As part of our membership the city has just appointed its first ever Commissioner for Resilience who will work with public, community and private sector partners over the next two years to develop a long term resilience strategy and implementation plan.

Membership of 100 Resilient Cities also brings a wealth of resource, expertise and new learning to the city. Belfast will have access to international toolkits, service providers and partners from the private, public and NGO sectors.

This is a significant gain for Belfast and the timing could not be better. There are opportunities to embed resilience thinking into long term planning as the City Council develops its first Spatial Plan.

A small number of UK cities are already members of the program including London, Manchester, Bristol and Glasgow.

Belfast was also chosen to take part in 100RC’s 2018 CityXChange summit. The event brought together a small number of cities to work with leading tech companies and a number of innovative start-ups to collaborate on a range of city challenges.

Older resident walking down street in Belfast neighbourhood

Homes for Healthy Ageing testbed in Belfast

A new healthy ageing testbed has been set up in Belfast to trial innovative approaches to tackling isolation and loneliness in older people as part of the £2.5 million Connected Places Catapult 'Homes for Healthy Ageing' Programme.

Innovators using virtual headsets with High Sheriff outside Belfast City Hall

Immersive technologies give glimpse of tourism’s future

Augment the City Showcase provides glimpses of how the future of tourism could look.

Night time and the exterior of Belfast City Hill is lit up with pillars of gree, blue, purple, red and yellow light.

Illuminate the playable city

The concept of a playable city is one which encourages city-dwellers to engage with public spaces in playful, fun and creative ways.