Revitalizing Post-Industrial Peripheries - Network for Sustainable Urban Regeneration

Former industrial and mining zones across East-Central Europe—especially in the urban and peri-urban fringes of mid-sized and shrinking cities—face severe challenges. These areas are marked by environmental degradation, economic disinvestment, and long-term social marginalization. Despite their historical significance to the region’s industrial growth, they often remain outside of mainstream planning agendas.

This initiative builds on the work of the Postindustrial Urban Periphery project to reframe these neglected territories as spaces of both risk and potential. We support community-driven, ecologically sound regeneration strategies rooted in local knowledge, while promoting cross-border exchange among actors facing similar postindustrial legacies.

Our main objective is to co-create a transnational framework for East-Central Europe to evaluate and transform brownfield sites in ways that are socially just and environmentally responsible. Through local engagement and regional collaboration, the project empowers municipalities, civic groups, researchers, and economic actors to reimagine these peripheries as future commons.

https://www.pad.network/projects/revitalizing-post-industrial-peripheries