Invited keynote paper to the Future of Urbanism, 10th Anniversary Congress of the Academy of Urbanism, London 2016.The paper dealt with the research undertaken for UN-Habitat on the cities of the 56 member states on the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe. Trends from the past 20 years were identified and concepts for future city planning and design explored, including the Compact City, the Resilient City and the Competitive City, with conclusions drawn about scenarios for the UK city system.