One year after BLOSSOM’s launch, what would you consider the project’s most significant achievement so far?
The main achievement so far has been laying the foundations for the next three years of work. And as it is the case with buildings, foundations are plural. In BLOSSOM’s case, foundations include technological components such as the development of the modelling tools that will eventually be integrated into a single Evaluation Modelling Toolkit, and the decision-making framework that will feed into the Digital Twins. The financial foundations include a self-assessment tool for bankability and de-risking mechanisms, and the design of financial tools. Considerable effort has gone into the context analysis, development of use case scenarios and of key performance indicators (KPIs), and on setting up financial-driven Living Labs. While some of these foundations are already pretty much complete, most will continue to be built over the next six months, and will come to fruition around the end of 2026.
How have the Front Runner and Follower cities contributed to the development of the BLOSSOM framework?
The BLOSSOM approach is grounded in its urban areas, so it should not come as a surprise that city and regional partners have engaged with all the different strands of the foundational activities. From contributing to the definition of use case scenarios and adaptive pathways to providing data necessary to the development of the models to be used in simulations and assessments, from testing a bankability self-assessment tool, to starting to involve relevant stakeholders at local level. BLOSSOM cities are buzzing, and the best part is that this is only the beginning.
As the project enters its second year, what key milestones or developments should stakeholders and citizens look forward to?
The second year of the project will see the finalisation of the “foundational” work, and then the beginning of the next phase of co-creation of the bankable interventions, with the proper activation of the Living Labs. Citizens and stakeholders will have the opportunity to actively participate in the selection of different scenarios, especially in the three Front Runner cities – Birmingham, Kielce and Lisbon. The array of digital tools developed by BLOSSOM will be deployed to simulate the impact of different proposed interventions, which will support decision-making and prioritisation of the solutions to be demonstrated starting in the third year of the project in the three Front-Runner cities, and eventually replicated in Follower cities, and beyond. Additionally, some preliminary tools and intermediate results will be made public in the coming twelve months, allowing other city administrations to take inspiration from the BLOSSOM experience as it develops.
