Whilst metropolitan areas are growing or at least having a stable number of inhabitants middle and smaller towns are shrinking, sometimes with serious rate. Along with this, these towns have obsolescence and workforce problem, because of the migration regards especially young and well educated people. The reasons for this are the absence of jobs, poor quality of infrastructure and connectivity to the next metropolitan area. Through the insufficient access to the public transport, there is no adequate network between the smaller towns and their peripherals. Therefore these areas are less attractive as residence for daily commuters and for labour intensive companies. Through the cooperation of local and regional institutions responsible for the development of small towns and in rural areas, Qualist will give positive examples to be evaluated, demography oriented solutions to be tested and concrete perspectives for typical CE small towns in rural areas to be elaborated. Achievements: Small towns face a number of demanding challenges due to changing framework conditions as for example demographic changes, the process of globalisation, an increasing competition between regions, small towns and cities, changing governance structures etc. While some regions and small towns are shrinking, others are more successful in dealing with challenges and positioning themselves. Even aside from metropolitan areas, there are regions displaying considerable dynamic high performance in regional development and potential for growth. For instance, small towns in the Lower Austrian Waldviertel region show an low increasing number of population and employment as well as a high gross value added. Since summer 2010 within the Central Europe programme our project QUALIST is subsequently searching for a vison of a Small Town in Central Europe 2020, elaborating solutions how to deal with the demographic and social change. As a basis for a definition of a Small Town Central Europe 2020 was on the objective of ensuring a high Quality of life and the Leipzig Charter agreed. The criteria for sustainable city mentioned in the Leipzig Charter: economic prosperity, social equity, healthy environment, cultural heritage, revitalised town centres, cultural activities (cultural diversity) and closer health care. The definition of quality of life is more difficult in the three partner countries. Quality of life is otherwise applicable in the Czech Republic than in the system for sustainable development in Germany and as the Austrian Strategy for Sustainable Development. Even the lively discussions with regional and local experts showed that in no way can be assumed that a uniform definition of quality of life. There are three focusses we work on: revitalization of small town centers, public transport and regional marketing. Concerning the first point, we developed revitalization concepts for small towns connected with pilot actions such as e.g. multi generation living in Adorf (Vogland), better connection between town center and station for pedestrians in Oelsnitz or a concept for traffic routing in Falkenstein that will really improve quailty of life in town center by intelligent traffic routing. In the Lower Austrian town Horn a broad cultural offer is based on a concept developed in the project and filled with life by engaged people. The Project Partners have had an intensive transnational exchange of experience about innovative operation schemes of public transport in rarely populated areas that will lead to improved mobility in South Bohemia. Furthermore various models of mobility centers were examinated. All PP take profit from the experience of our Project Partner Interkomm Waldviertel concerning regional and local marketing and shared with the Project Partners in several workshops.