Amid credit crunch and house price doom and gloom, it's easy to forget the journey our cities have been on over the last couple of decades. There's been something of the urban renaissance in cities across the UK, which have enjoyed sustained policy attention from Conservative and Labour Ministers.

UK cities have also seen a national drive to hold back urban sprawl and keep the high street alive, and more support for the less well-off families living in urban areas.

Ex-industrial cities like Leeds and Sheffield have seen jobs grow by 15 and 25 per cent respectively in a single decade. Our rejuvenated city and town centres attract vast numbers of visitors. In Leeds alone, the numbers employed by the hotel and restaurant industry has increased by around 20 per cent in the last five years. Cities are once again popular places to live, work and do business.

This was no overnight turnaround. At the Centre for Cities, we published our latest research with Brookings, a Washington-based research institute. The findings point to UK innovations which the next US administration and American mayors could investigate – to help American cities compete in the future.

First, American leaders could learn from UK efforts to keep alive town and city centres. The 1980s and early 1990s saw a proliferation of out-of-town shopping malls, akin to developments already dominant in the States. But in 1996, the Conservative Government put "Town Centre First" planning rules in place to hold back the numbers of out-of-town shopping centres and office parks – and stop town and city centres turning into ghost towns. Shopping in Leeds centre has now become a tourist attraction in itself.

The subsequent Labour Government took further steps to beat suburban sprawl by using planning targets to re-use urban land wherever possible – rather than building further out into the countryside. By 2006, almost three-quarters of new developments were taking place on brownfield land – helping cities like Leeds and Birmingham to avoid becoming a series of car dependent suburbs.

Meanwhile, sprawling Atlanta and Los Angeles have become known
for their lengthy commutes and daily gridlock.

The US could also learn from the UK's family tax credit system, which, for all the criticism of its complexity, has helped people back into work and provided a safety-net for low and middle-income families across UK cities.

This was an idea we originally swiped off the Americans, but the UK's system is more generous and paid more regularly – monthly rather than annually – helping families
meet ongoing expenses over the year. The average number claiming benefits in Leeds has fallen from 16 per cent in 1999 to 13 per cent in 2007, two per cent below Great Britain's average.

Lastly, the US could look at how UK cities have risen up the national agenda and out of the shadows of industrial decline. Kick-started by Michael Heseltine's city development initiatives, cities have continued to benefit from close attention of senior Ministers. Tony Blair's Social Exclusion Unit, Gordon Brown's target to reduce child poverty and John Prescott's expert Urban Task Force all show a sustained effort to prioritise physical regeneration and economic growth in deprived areas.

With typical British modesty, we haven't tended to shout about these successes. New York mayor Michael Bloomberg's meeting with London's new mayor, and their promise to swap ideas and experts from the capital's transport projects to crime fighting in the Big Apple, marks a
turn in the tide. And I'm not surprised to see city mayors at the forefront.

There are, of course, lessons that we can still learn from the States. Britain is one of the most centralised countries in the world. Only five per cent of tax revenues are raised by our councils locally, compared with 41 per cent in the US. This holds back UK cities' ability to innovate and grow their economies.

Major urban areas, such as the Leeds city region, might benefit from US-style elected mayors who – with more control over their own finances – could drive forward major transport and housing improvements in
the city.

But the policy learning can – and should – go both ways. We have our own urban policy ideas to shout about which could help build stronger cities at home and abroad.


Dermot Finch is the director of Centre for Cities. It has just published a report Smarter, Stronger Cities: UK Urban Policy Innovations and Lessons for the US, which is available to download (www.centreforcities/smarterstrongercities)