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Dear Eura Members,

Announcement: EURA has a new website!

On behalf of the Governing Board of the European Urban Research Association (EURA) I am delighted to announce the launch of our new website http://eura.org/. We have spent the last year co-designing this new virtual space for EURA members to share information and ideas. 

We hope very much that you will find the website to be both welcoming and interesting.  In particular we hope you will consider contributing to EURA Conversations, a new democratic space intended to open up a lively exchange of views on the implications of the Covid-19 pandemic for urban studies.

The new website provides information about our association - our history, our aims and objectives, who we are and what we do and have been doing since EURA was founded in 1997.  It profiles our recent and forthcoming conferences and provides a record of the many conference that have been hosted by our dedicated members.

In addition the website presents information about our international journal, Urban Research and Practice, our initiatives, like the EURA Best Paper Prize, our established working groups and our other activities.   The website also outlines our longstanding collaborations with other international scientific associations, in particular the Urban Affairs Association, based in North America, and the Association of European Schools of Planning. 

Our aim is for the website to provide an up to date picture of the way EURA, an international, multi-disciplinary network, is striving to co-create a lively environment for researchers and practitioners who are passionate about the importance of the “urban” in modern life.

The launch of the new website is accompanied by a new EURA newsletter.  Refreshed in both format and editorial organisation, this newsletter aims to reach all members and inform them about current ordinary and extraordinary activities.  The newsletter will also provide a way of inviting you to take an active role in our association and will explain how you can contribute.

Finally, as mentioned above, a new section of the website, titled EURA conversations, has been launched. It is conceived as a blog focussed on the implications of the Covid-19 pandemic for cities and urban studies.  Authors provide short contributions and we invite EURA members to offer comments so that conversations can develop.

One of our founding fathers, Robin Hambleton volunteered to start this conversation, addressing the topic of Leadership.  To get the EURA conversations off to a lively start we have two other short blogs – Ignazio Vinci on Proximity and Filipe Teles on Experimentation.  Please take a look and offer a comment or comments if you wish.  We plan to publish a new contribution on a relevant topic once a week from now on.

Unfortunately this year we will not be able to be together in person in the EURA Annual Conference scheduled for June in Oslo.  It is sad that Covid-19 is stopping us from gathering together in Norway, but this does not mean that we should not continue to share insights, knowledge and understandings. 

The Governing Board wants to offer special thanks to Susanne Soholt and her colleagues in Oslo, as well as all the Track co-chairs, for putting together such an exciting conference programme.  We are developing new plans for 2021 and we will provide an update you on these plans in the period ahead.

In the meantime please follow our activities and contribute to EURA through our new website and our social media channels.

With all good wishes

Valeria Fedeli

President of EURA on behalf of the EURA Governing Board.