Publications

This report measures Melbourne’s all-round performance against 20 peer cities.

This 7th edition of the report - updated to a new digital format - provides an international assessment of Oslo’s performance relative to other similar cities.

These 3 reports, written for the City of Victoria, Canada, and funded by the South Island Prosperity Project benchmark the city’s performance against peer cities, delve deeper into Victoria’s journey, and explore the future of the city on a global stage.

This report explores how the UK can draw on its expertise to help address Latin American cities to address net zero challenges.

Our new handbook, developed in collaboration with Connected Places Catapult, helps to guide place leaders on how to host innovation and deliver innovation outcomes that underpin local well-being and national productivity.

This 6th edition of the Benchmarking Sydney report highlights Sydney's strengths and weaknesses as a leading city in the new post-Covid era.

Our 2021 update to the 2017 ‘Logic of Innovation Locations’ report explores the role of Innovation Districts, Corridors and Quarters as hubs of the Covid-adjusted innovation economy.

This paper explores e-mobility dynamics in 3 major Indonesian cities - Surabaya, Bandung and Denpasar.

This report draws on a combination of global benchmarks, global citizen sentiment data and expert intelligence to review the strengths and weaknesses of Helsinki’s brand in the global system of cities.

This annual report highlights Sydney’s strengths and weaknesses as a leading city in the new post-Covid era.

This new research, carried out with JLL, develops a framework to help recognise cities that have the key attributes for future success.

This new scene-setting snapshot paper explores the impact of Covid-19 on the long-term plans of river cities.

This report is the first from the London Futures review. It examines London’s recent history and development to the present day, explores the global challenges facing London and considers their potential impact on London’s future.

COVID-19 has added urgency to the agenda to transform the innovation and delivery capacity of cities, regions and local governments around the world. The innovation imperative at subnational levels needs to be served by agile collaboration globally.

This report benchmarks how Holland Metropole's five cities would perform if they were measured as a single metropolis.

The EIB’s evolution as a financial and knowledge partner for cities puts it at the heart of global action for progress in our metropolitan century.

Our new research looks at the rapidly evolving global system of cities, the impact of the major forces of change on global urban dynamics

Prof. Greg Clark and Dr Tim Moonen contribute to this important compilation, produced by L'Institut Paris Region, on the outlook for global cities and the models that will make them survive and succeed into the 22nd century.

Our team contributed to this HSBC Centre of Sustainable Finance report, which outlines a zero-carbon pathway for cities, by highlighting the changes that can be made in electricity generation, transport, construction, real estate and other areas.

Borane Gille, Opportune Simon, and Prof. Greg Clark contributed to the comparative analysis of the world's seven mega-regions, led by HSBC.

Grow with Warsaw was a series of workshop meetings between the City of Warsaw and real estate players held in 2018. Greg Clark, Opportune Simon and Jake Nunley discuss the findings from the workshops and describe next steps for the city's competitiveness.

This 5th edition of report provides an international assessment of Oslo’s performance relative to other similar cities. The report summarises Oslo’s progress in the current cycle and reflects on its opportunities and imperatives in the next period.

This paper assesses Glasgow’s current and future business and jobs advantages and appeal in the global economy. The aim is to understand how well the world understands and recognises Glasgow’s economic assets and capabilities.

Volume 2 is the Greater Sydney Case study, which reviews the opportunities for arts and culture in Greater Sydney and NSW. The report highlights the role that creativity have in attracting investment and making NSW a great place to live, work and visit.

Volume 1 reviews more than 100 global reports, benchmark studies and comparative data sets to show the links between culture, place and value. It also reveals important links between culture and other public policy goals.

In this essay, Tim Moonen, Jake Nunley and Greg Clark examine how London’s unpromising 1980s gave rise to three decades of reinvestment, and explain how the EIB played a catalytic role in successive cycles of London’s evolution.

The time of the multi-city metropolis has come. In several of the global cities we work with, leaders are revisiting the opportunity to partner more effectively with the surrounding cities in their region in order to provide attractive choices for all.

In the first of a series of essays on cities, Dr Tim Moonen, Jake Nunley and Prof. Greg Clark take a definitive look at how Europe’s cities transformed from post-industrial decline to thriving, prosperous and liveable metropolises.

This research highlights Sydney’s strengths and weaknesses, helping civic leaders and key stakeholders plan for future growth while addressing the pain points.

There are four comprehensive papers and a summary report prepared for the Property Council of Australia by Professor Greg Clark, Dr Tim Moonen and our colleagues at The Business of Cities Ltd.

Essay published through LSE Cities' book "Shaping Cities in an Urban Age"

The NSW Innovation and Productivity Council (IPC) developed the report NSW Innovation Precincts to provide a view of what makes different types of innovation precincts succeed, and identify the common risks and failures.

This report examines the underpinning ingredients required for a region to host the innovation economy. It explores international learnings and examples from regions such as Bavaria, Massachusetts and Ontario, to support Industry NSW's work in this area.

The benchmarking report for Oslo Business Region summarised Oslo's progress in the current cycle and its opportunities and imperatives in the next period.

This case study is one of the two notes emerging from the report published with ULI Europe, a review of Italy’s great northern cities.

Our detailed review of the prospects for Northern Italy's two largest cities was presented in Milan to an large audience of investors, developers, politicians and civic leaders.

In our Typology of World Cities 2018 developed in partnership with JLL, we have identified 10 city groups each playing a distinct role on the global stage.

Our groundbreaking analysis of SEQ's performance vs other high quality of life trading city-regions has been published by Queensland Government in 2018. See our Publications Page for full details.

This study demonstrates that while other global regions excel in individual areas, the Holland Metropole has the breadth, scale, diversity and dynamics to deserve comparison with the world’s best.

A paper examining various international case studies of Connected Cities for the Greater Sydney Commission

Infrastructure Australia is an independent statutory body with a mandate to prioritise and progress nationally significant infrastructure.

This book was published by UN Habitat in conjunction with the World Bank and the IDB. The publication seeks to contribute to the multi-dimensional perspective required for thinking and addressing challenges of metropolitan governance issues.

The Future of Urban Development Aid and Assistance: Market Landscape and Strategic Advice.

To achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, an estimated $3 trillion to $4 trillion is needed annually. In an increasingly urban world, cities play a pivotal role in closing this financial gap.

This report considers international case studies of metropolitan strategic planning from a range of metro areas that have similar features to Greater Newcastle.

This second edition report of Benchmarking Sydney's Performance is a study of the city's comparative strengths, based on the latest data from an impressive range of indicators and research into Sydney’s peers on the international stage.

In collaboration with JLL, we look at the developments in the field of city benchmarking, and the role city indices play in shaping our understanding of global city competitiveness. We provide implications for the real estate sector.​​

The benchmarking report for Oslo Business Region summarised Oslo's progress in the current cycle and its opportunities and imperatives in the next period.

EU mobility urban approach.

In this report we identified 12 fundamental drivers for Innovation Locations, as well as 20 ecosystem attributes for areas to develop, enhance and monitor for locations to succeed as innovation hubs or hotspots.

Agglomeration, Centres and District Plans: Greater Sydney Commission

This paper is about how leadership teams are built and run, to enable cities to move beyond the governance deficit and into sustained phases of innovation.

The 16 chapter book takes a global perspective to show how national governments and states/provinces/regions continue to play a decisive, and often positive, partnership role with world cities.

This study is the third paper in a groundbreaking series exploring the latest trends in city benchmarking and performance. This latest report by JLL and The Business of Cities takes a deeper look at the different ways cities are categorised and compared.

In Global Cities: A Short History, Greg Clark, an internationally renowned global urbanist, examines the enduring forces—such as trade, migration, diversity and technology—that have enabled some cities to emerge from the pack into global leadership.

A report for the JLL Cities Research Centre (2016) on Governance, Devolution and the Investment Ready City.

With Research Professor Dr Gert-Joost Peek, Professor Greg Clark and Dr Tim Moonen delve into a comparative analysis of city-level strategies for planning, placemaking and promotion.

This review explores the economic competitors to London, and in particular to the West End. We examined six cities and their relevant central district sector specialisations, as a direct competitor to the West End.

UCLG would like to acknowledge, in particular, the contribution of The Business of Cities to Sections 1, 2.1 to 2.3, and 3.1 to 3.2.

Cities all over the world are competing to for the talent, visitors, investors and attention. Oslo is a young, dynamic and compact city with lots of potential, but how is it really doing as a city?

Launched at ULI Belgium’s inaugural Annual Conference in May 2016, this report assesses Belgium’s two largest cities along 12 dimensions of competitiveness.

Glasgow Chamber of Commerce and the Urban Land Institute wanted to consider how constantly evolving technologies would influence consumer behaviours and potentially impact the city centre experience in the next five years.

This is the second of two papers commissioned by the Committee from Professor Greg Clark. This companion piece builds on work published by Professor Clark in 2012. It is about the importance of a city’s identity, reputation and branding.

Globally, cities are now the dominant locations for production, consumption and human settlement - and their number, scale and influence is set to increase in the century ahead.

Istanbul is a dynamic and increasingly successful ‘Emerging World City’, despite a background of rising geopolitical risks.

This report explores the question of density and urban change by looking more closely at the experience of six European cities. It examines how density may play a role in helping cities in cycles of growth or shrinkage to succeed in the future.

This 2015 report examines what we mean by the term density, and explored the long term benefits density offers to people, the environment and on investments.

Through the partnership between ULI and the Oslo Metropolitan Area, this report aimed to address a critically important issue: how the real estate industry must adapt and meet the demands for sustainable spaces for innovation and enhancing quality of life.

As part of a collaboration between ULI and the City of Rotterdam, this case study of Munich was developed in order to explore the ways in which cities can foster an innovation ecosystem and build a strategy to establish themselves as innovation hubs.

This paper, produced jointly by JLL and The Business of Cities, offers a fresh approach to understanding city performance and prospects. A new typology of cities is presented, with a focus on the trends, challenges and real estate implications.

This paper reviews the origins, definitions, trends and pathways of knowledge about future cities and the future of cities.

Greg Clark, Tim Moonen and Emily Moir along with their partners at OECD LEED view local economic development as a complex process that requires unique kinds of leadership if it is to succeed. Case studies of Amsterdam, Hamburg, Manchester, and Stockholm.

Greg Clark, Tom Moonen and Emily Moir wrote the "Underpowered Cities" article in LSE Cities' "Governing Urban Future".

A case study for the Global Cities Initiative : A joint project of Brookings and JPMorgan Chase

This report, the 4th developed by our team, assembles the widest range of comparative studies and reports on city performance to date. It includes 200 indices in total, up from 160 in 2013. C

Hong Kong: A globally fluent metropolitan city written for the Global Cities Initiative, a Brookings and JPMorgan Chase joint project.

One important trend in the investigation into the future of cities is the rapidly evolving relationship between cities and business

This essay was commissioned as part of the UK Government’s Foresight Future of Cities Project, September 2014.

City Government and the Local Business Growth and Investment Climate.

A case study for the Global Cities Initiative : A Joint Project of Brookings and JPMorgan Chase.

Canadian cities are collectively entering a newly energised, globally connected and impactful era. Of its 12 main commercial hubs, we identified the Canadian Quartet (Montreal, Toronto, Calgary and Vancouver) as holding most promise as future world cities.

The ULI Europe publication 'To Bid Or Not To Bid: Making Global Events Work For City Development' re-examines the key challenges involved in deciding whether to bid, how to bid, which events to bid for, and how to make the most of such opportunities.

In the latest cycle of globalisation, ongoing economic integration has added to the number of internationalising cities whose roles in trade, services, migration and labour markets all exceed national boundaries.

The 2014 report explains for the first time how International Financial Institutions (IFIs) are responding to the rapid rise in urbanisation and how they will help us build the cities of the future.

Swift global integration, the rapid expansion of a global consumer class, and the rise of urban areas as the engines of global economic growth have ushered in a new era that demands more global engagement from America’s city and regional leaders.

This note assesses the recent trends in European city traderelated performance, as measured in over 100 quantitative and perception-led benchmarks and studies, including work undertaken by Brookings Institution and LSE Cities.

The Making of a World City: London 1991-2021 sets out in clear detail both the catalysts that have enabled London to succeed and also the qualities and underlying values that are at play.

Delivering Local Development: New Growth and Investment Strategies

This InfoBurst distils the conversations held at a ULI Urban Investment Network workshop on City Branding held at MIPIM, Cannes, France in March 2011.

A peer review of the Olympic and Paralympic legacy for East London proposed by the UK Dept. of Communities and Local Government.

A Report of the Urban Investment Network

A ULI Urban Investment Network Report

The Role of Development Agencies and Companies

Since the economic crisis beginning in September 2007 with the collapse of banks in the UK and USA, we have seen the triggering of a global recession and wider processes of economic restructuring.

The mission of the Urban Land Institute is to provide leadership in the responsible use of land and in creating thriving communities worldwide.

This book identifies how staging international events works as a trigger for local development, and what hosting cities and nations can do to ensure that a positive local legacy and wider benefits are realised.