Europe's "Cities on the Edge" fight back

On January 1, two years after Liverpool and three years before Marseilles, Istanbul becomes European Capital of Culture for 2010.  For five years these great ports, together with Bremen, Gdansk and Naples, have been trying to form a network of European cities "of ill repute". 

Marseilles: a "City on the Edge"?

They are the cities that love to be hated: rebellious and out of the ordinary, founded as ports but largely insular in outlook, they are cities of football and plunder.  But they are fighting back, turning to culture to help them on the road to recovery.  In 2010 Istanbul is European Capital of Culture, two years after Liverpool and three years before Marseilles. Almost by chance these three multi-cultural cities, together with Naples, Bremen and Gdansk, have embarked on an adventure known as "Cities on the Edge", a support network of the “most hated cities in their own countries".