Meanwhile strategies from the REFILL project

REFILL was one of the EU’s URBACT projects which allowed ten cities across Europe to exchange knowledge and share their experiences with meanwhile use. Thus, the participating local authorities had each developed instruments to encourage temporary use and reduce urban vacancy: legislation, funds, financial instruments, agencies, networks, (digital) platforms, etc.

Source: URBACTinteractive map

REFILL’s work has been widely documented and all the outputs are available online. The publications offer useful information for all the actors involved in meanwhile use, in terms of: 

• Fitting temporary use in the legal framework
• Temporary use as an asset to reduce exclusion
• Brokering between stakeholders involved in temporary use 
• Temporary use as slow urban planning
• Supporting temporary use
• Developing temporary use as a normal service
• Common ownership
• Transitional or transformative temporary use
• Urban labs and strategic temporary use

The network's final publication compiles and summarises all the lessons learnt and points towards other helpful tools such as:

• a matchmaking approach between city authority departments and bottom-up initiatives which are candidates for meanwhile use
• a road map with key steps to nurture meanwhile projects
• a value creation plan that helps cast a range of future possible developments in a temporary use project
• and last but not least, the short animation presenting the principles, benefits and challenges of meanwhile use

Written by Lorena Axinte