Category: Climate neutral urban development

Envisaging the Future of Cities

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Urbanization is intertwined with several existential global challenges: Cities do not exist in isolation from global challenges. The emergence of urbanization as a global megatrend is intertwined with the existential challenges that the world has faced in the last 50 years, including climate change, rising inequality and the rise in zoonotic viruses with the latest being the novel coronavirus pandemic, which triggered the worst public health crisis in a century and the worst economic recession since the Great Depression. These challenges will in different ways, leave their imprints on the future of cities.

In UN-Habitat’s new World Cities Report 2022 – Envisaging the Future of Cities, three scenarios, or three paths were identified, that the world’s cities could take at this critical juncture.

  • In the worst-case or “high damage” scenario, we assume that policy-making and governance will become even weaker and more ineffective. The destructive effects of the pandemic, climate change, inequality, poverty, and long-running conflicts, if not adequately addressed, will have disastrous consequences for cities in both developed and developing countries, though the latter would suffer most because of existing vulnerabilities. If 80 per cent of the economic damage inflicted by COVID-19 persists for a decade, then the number of people living in poverty could increase by more than 200 million by 2050.
  • The middling, or “pessimistic scenario”, foresees a reversion to the status quo before the pandemic. This business-as-usual approach would be characterised by exploitation and exclusion of informal sector workers, systemic discrimination of the urban poor, unimaginative policies and poor implementation on the climate crisis, public transport, or urban regeneration programmes and renewal. Cities could be locked into cycles of poverty, poor productivity, unhealthy living conditions and become inequality traps for decades.
  • The report, however, also envisages an optimistic future. Governments and donors would invest in urban development sufficiently to create just, resilient, healthy, and prosperous cities everywhere. By 2050, there could be 260 million people lifted out of poverty compared to the pre-COVID baseline. National governments would embrace peace and diplomacy to resolve their differences rather than pursuing military action, avoiding drastic global economic consequences such as those inflicted on the supply of food and energy by the war in Ukraine. Governments would manage the remainder of the COVID-19 pandemic competently, balancing health outcomes and economic recovery, and thus smoothing out global supply chains. They would also prepare adequately for the next pandemic.

Video: Pop-up bike lanes during the Pandemic

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Reducing the number of accidents, while at the same time increasing safety for everyone? Bogotá showed us, that this is possible and that the key to promote sustainable urban planning and environmentally friendly mobility are pop-up bike lanes. The concept of pop-up bike lanes, which emerged especially due to the COVID pandemic, is spreading not only in Bogotá, but also worldwide, for example in Berlin.

Both cities face the challenge that for a long time the principle of the car-friendly city was pursued in urban and transport planning. With an increase in cyclists during the pandemic and the limitation of public space, it was necessary to rethink and meet the needs of residents, for example to increase road safety for cyclists. This Good Practice outlines the undertaken measures in transport planning, the opinions of residents to the new concept and how in the end all road users can benefit from pop-up bike lanes in the long term, whether in Bogotá or Berlin.

The Protagonists are:

  • Sebastián Posada García (Bicycle and Pedestrian Sub-Dictorate, Bogotá)
  • Dr. Lea Wisken (Head of Cycling and Pedestrian Coordination Office, Berlin)

Watch video at YouTube (with mit English or Spanish sub-title):

https://youtu.be/TQGLzHmxxE4

Green Urban Development: learning from inspiring examples of implementation

Posted on by erik

How do we promote climate neutral urban development?

The world must drastically reduce its CO2 emissions by 2050 to avert the worst impacts of climate change. Globally, we are seeing an influx into cities over the past 30 years and, cities are one of the main spaces where CO2 emissions are directly caused. Emissions in urban areas stem from construction projects, traffic flows, increasing energy consumption from a growing population, production of waste and other factors. “However, the urban space is also the solution space for the climate change,” said one of the participants in the working groups on Green Urban Development. This sentiment was also reflected in a study conducted by the German Advisory Council on Global Change, among other studies carried out globally.

Urban solutions include, for example, the use of new mobility formats such as traffic-calmed urban spaces, roll-out of innovative of e-mobility and bike lane solutions, the reduction of pollution from resource intensive economic sectors, more sustainable building and renovation practices based on circularity, development of urban spaces to promote local economic cycles and community activities and, decentralized energy supply and waste concepts.

Aim of the working groups on Green Urban Development

The COVID-19 program “Green Urban Development” was implemented in cooperation with the consulting company Mesopartner and the Wuppertal Institute. The program included three working groups, each with 3 to 4 cities and their representatives, mostly partners from local city governments or local research institutions. The objective was to promote the implementation of concrete projects that promote climate neutral city efforts

The three working groups had the following focus areas:

  • Working Group 1: Mobility solutions in cities
  • Working group 2: The transformation of urban spaces and reuse of “urban space” through new community formats and mobility solutions
  • Working Group 3: A mixed group linking urban energy, mobility and spatial approaches

From the formation of the working groups, it became clear that solution approaches often overlap or, that different solutions can approaches create synergies. This also enabled an exchange of experiences between the working groups. The participating cities in the program were Bhuj/Ahmedabad, Belo Horizonte, Kochi, Lalitpur, Dortmund, Buenos Aires, Quito, Montevideo, Hamburg, Kigali, Kisumu and Bremen.

First, second and third process steps: From ideas to concrete project proposals

In a first step, project ideas were developed in the respective working group:

  • Creation of a bicycle traffic concept using the example of the bicycle paths in Lalitpur
  • Creation of a child-friendly environmental zone in the neighborhood and the design of speed-reduced recreation areas
  • Greening of roofs to create a sustainable and green urban environment and combining it with renewable energy solutions and urban gardening activities
  • Municipal bio-waste management at the neighborhood level in collaboration with local citizens
  • Promotion of traffic-calming zones in Kigali
  • Increasing green, retention and infiltration areas in cities.
  • Application of sensor technologies to analyze neighborhoods and places with high Co2 emissions.
  • Planning pop-up bike lanes and building safe bike lanes.
  • Last-mile connectivity solutions and electro-based logistics solutions in the center of cities.

In bilateral meetings the topics of interest were explored, and the cities exchange on their experiences.

In a second step of the project, larger network meetings were organized in each working group. Here, the cities in the respective working group exchanged their experiences and presented inspiring implementation approaches. A variety of solution approaches and experience reports were exchanged here, including the creation of a pollution mapping and the e-mobility concept of Kigali, first last mile connectivity approaches in Buenos Aires, the development of the e-mobility hub in Quito, pop-up lanes in Berlin, environmental zones and bike lanes approaches in Belo Horizonte, the development of first bike lanes and app sharing concepts in Lalitpur, etc.

Based on this concrete exchange across the working groups, further bilateral experience exchange meetings were initiated to further develop initial ideas of prototypes. The prototypes included:

  • Delivery/unloading areas and electronic transport via hubs in the old city of Buenos Aires
  • Child-friendly and traffic-calming spaces in Bhuj
  • Scaling up bicycle infrastructure projects and app-sharing solutions in Lalitpur.

Based on these prototypes, concrete project proposals were developed with the objective to start fund raising for the implementation of the initiatives. In the Urban Space working group, Bhuj will implement the project “Safe access to schools for children through child-friendly and traffic-calmed zones.” The mobility-urban space-energy working group developed a project for Belo Horizonte, the establishment of an urban ecology laboratory. The exchanges in the Mobility Working Group eventually led to the project “Applied Technology for Loading and Unloading Public Zones in Buenos Aires”.

Implementation of Green City Pioneer of Change Events

In addition to the internal network exchange in the working groups, other stakeholders from cities around the world were involved in the reflection process for new climate-neutral city solutions. For this purpose, two large “Green City Pioneer of Change” workshops were organized, where in each of them more than 50 international participants were presented. The events had the objective to share good practices as well as to reflect jointly on key success factors and challenges. 

Detailed information

A variety of input speeches, video presentations, presentations, workshop results and good practices can be found on the Connective Cities website from various documented events:

Connective Cities Lab- Expert Input
with Climate City Expert Prof. Oliver Lah (Wuppertal Institut), 11. November 2021: https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/968

Participation of the three working groups in Design Thinking Workshops (15-17.11 2021):

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/959

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/960

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/961

Working group meeting with exchange of good practices in the working group „Mobility“

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/1102

Working group meeting with exchange of good practices in the working group Urban Space, Mobility, Energy (03.12.21)

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/1095

First large Green City Pioneers of Change Event (19.01.2022)

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/1111

Second Green City Pioneers of Change Event (25.02.22)

https://community.connective-cities.net/en/node/1130

Scaling up cycling infrastructure in Lindau, Germany

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As cycling is becoming increasingly popular for leisure and as an alternative to using the car, municipalities have to adapt their cycling infrastructure. However, they should not forget to involve their citizens in the planning process.

Toolbox citizen engagement for sustainable mobility planning and implementation

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The success of sustainable mobility plans and projects often depends on the commitment and acceptance by citizens. Therefore, citizen engagement in planning and implementation of sustainable mobility in municipalities turns out to be a key success factor not only for impactful implementation of new concepts, but also for co-creating smart sustainable mobility measures. This happens when solutions are developed together with stakeholders.

Due to the consequences of the pandemic citizen engagement is limited or impossible. This can endanger the success and/or slowing down necessary sustainable mobility projects. For this reason, the Connective Cities working group «Sustainable Mobility after COVID-19» created a prototype for «Toolbox citizen engagement for sustainable mobility planning and implementation».

The toolbox covers different levels and degrees of participation. It is a collection of successful tools and roadmaps that can be used in different phases of sustainable mobility planning and implementation in and after the pandemic.

Municipal Response to the Covid-19 Pandemic – MENA region

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In the wake of the Pandemic, municipalities in the MENA region in both urban and rural areas need to rethink their modes of operation and accelerate their shift towards building resilience during the recovery process. In an effort to support municipalities that are members of the Connective Cities network in the MENA region, four thematic working groups were established as part of Connective Cities program ‘Municipal Recovery from the Pandemic.’ Objectives of this working group include promoting practice–oriented knowledge exchange between municipal and urban practitioners, facilitating peer learning on sustainable and innovative approaches to build resilience in cities through biodiversity and environmental protection, digitalisation of municipal services, and promoting social entrepreneurship for circularity. The program has resulted in the development of concrete urban solutions. Another outcome was the creation of partnerships between municipalities as well as with private sector actors to articulate the proposed solutions and scale up the impact. This report summarizes the main achievements until February 2022.

Planning by doing – Tactical Urbanism during the COVID-19 pandemic

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On 16 February 2022 Connective Cities invited three experts on tactical urbanism to share their insights with over 55 participants from Jordan, Ukraine, Nepal, Germany, Namibia, Burkina-Faso, Congo RDC and Spain, among others. In the one-and-a-half-hour session the benefits of using tactical urbanism as a new approach to shaping the urban space were presented via examples form Barcelona, New Delhi, Chennai, Kochi and Coimbatore. Particularly noteworthy was the great interest shown by practitioners from city administration, especially from German municipalities, who were astonished that radical planning approaches can be implemented in large cities without major judicial disputes. The event forms part of the series “Insight Sessions: (Post-)COVID Urban Futures”, which facilitates recurring exchange on various topics of sustainable urban development in the (post-)COVID-19 era. The brief and concise format of exchange is intended to initiate reflection and present innovative solutions to local challenges.

Call for participants: How to promote locally-driven knowledge networks for climate neutral city development solutions

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“How to assure a locally-driven and knowledge network-oriented approach to Climate neutral City Development?” is one of the key questions the 2nd Green City Pioneers of Change Workshop will provide answers to. Join us in this 2nd Pioneer-Event and register here!

As part of the Connective Cities’ recovery program on “Municipal response to COVID-19” the topical cluster “Green Urban Development” is currently working on synergies between mobility and urban space solutions involving cities like e.g. Kigali, Kisumu, Hamburg, Hanoi, Dortmund, Belo Horizonte, Kochi, Lalitpur, Quito, and Buenos Aires.

The cluster wants to encourage an exchange between Green City Pioneers of Change which involves, apart from peer-learning between the above-mentioned cities, two public events.

The first of the two planned Green City Pioneers of Change Workshops was conducted on 19. January 2022. It focused on the presentation of inspirational international practices and encouraged a reflection among city pioneers on how to promote first green initiatives and the role of pioneers in facilitating them (see video and case documentation here).

This 2nd Green City Pioneers of Change Workshop on 25 February 2022 will focus on the reflection of critical success criteria for the promotion of bottom-up approaches to Climate neutral City Development. The cities cooperating in the cluster and the experts facilitating the cluster will share their efforts and their way of learning in

  1. the creation of local knowledge networks that integrate young researchers und local universities, change makers in the local administration, existing firms and start-ups with new business models
  2. promoting several smaller “learning by doing” and implementation-oriented initiatives that are becoming building blocks for a more systemic transformation approach in the respective cities.

Based on the presentation of these concrete experiences we will reflect with the participants in an interactive way on the need and ways to promote a locally versus mainly externally driven approach to Climate neutral City Development.

Join us in this 2nd City Pioneer of Change Event! Register now here.

Conference language is English.

Unturning the Stones – Exploring Climate Finance for Asian Cities

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In the event 25 urban practitioners and experts from 6 countries exchanged on innovative and efficient financing approaches to build climate resilient and low-carbon cities. They were united by the fact that all of them are working at the forefront of climate change mitigation and adaptation measures in their cities. The event was jointly organised by Connective Cities, TURBOCLIC (Transformation – Urban Opportunities – Climate Change), an initiative from GIZ’s sector networks TUEWAS (Transport Environment Energy and Water in Asia) and SNGA (Governance Asia).

Further information, presentations and impressions