Connective Cities
INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE FOR SUSTAINABLE URBAN DEVELOPMENT
NEWSLETTER - EDITION No. 49, June 2022

Dear Readers,

a greener urban development comes with many benefits. It mitigates the effects of climate change and pandemics, increases urban biodiversity, improves food security. It turns cities into more livable places. In this newsletter issue, we present you a wide spectrum of solutions and project ideas that have been developed in our Connective Cities working groups. We also highlight very specific good practices: improving irrigation and environmental education in Maputo, a tree nursery in Karak, urban gardens in Amman, a composting plant in Quito, innovative bicycle infrastructure in Lindau.

More livable cities and collaborative gardening also strengthens social cohesion. Social cohesion, in turn, is an important fuel for sustainable urban development in many fields of action – such as crisis management, solidarity support for Ukrainian municipalities, localizing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), or cross-border city partnership support in times of lockdowns.

We cordially invite you to our events in June that are dedicated to some of these topics.

Wishing you an inspiring read

Your Connective Cities Team

Review
Green Urban Development: learning from inspiring examples of implementation
A review of the Connective Cities COVID-19 program's working groups on Green Urban Development (September 2021 – May 2022)

How can we promote a climate-neutral urban development? New mobility formats, e-mobility and bike lane solutions, sustainable buildings and building redevelopments, urban spaces to promote local economic cycles, and decentralized energy supply and waste concepts - these are just some of the approaches and project ideas discussed within the working group. 

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Improving irrigation, compost management and environmental education
Virtual Workshop on Urban Gardening between the districts of Pankow, Berlin, Germany and KaTembe, Maputo, Mozambique

Environmental education, use and collection of rainwater for efficient irrigation and composting – these were central topics of the exchange of experience and the starting point for the joint development of solutions. The two districts now intend to affirm their partnership in order to intensify the exchange of knowledge and experience. 

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The development of Covid-19 recovery solutions at municipal level in the area of digitalisation and crisis management
A REPORT ON THE WORK IN THE SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE (SEE) NETWORK FROM SEPTEMBER 2021 TO DECEMBER 2021

The report describes in detail the capacity-building processes conducted to support municipal resilience within the working groups of digitalization and crisis management over the course of several months, while also highlighting good practices that were identified and small urban initiatives that were developed together during the collaboration with urban practitioners from across the SEE region.

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How can members of the international community help Ukraine during the current war?
Review of the Insight Session on 17 May 2022

More than 50 participants from six different countries (Georgia, Germany, Ukraine, UK, Belgium, Lithuania) joined the Connective Cities Insight Session in order to raise awareness on the current state of needs in Ukraine, how municipalities are tackling the challenges and how the international community can support Ukraine and its citizens.

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Insights
Scaling up cycling infrastructure in Lindau, Germany
A strategy for climate-friendly mobility with a participatory approach

Since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic, the city of Lindau, located on Lake Constance, has been experiencing a bicycle and e-bike boom. Already before the pandemic, the municipality was a very popular destination for bicycle tourists, but now the existing  infrastructure was reaching its limits. The solution: expansion of the bike path network and mobile bike parking facilities with the population involved in the planning process. 

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Seeds for the Future
Restoring the ecosystem through a municipal nursery in Karak municipality, Jordan

With the support of the Minaret project, the community of Karak built a nursery with a large greenhouse of 440 square meters and more than 1,000 mother plants. The result: preservation of biodiversity, reduced CO2 emissions, new jobs, savings in the community budget and strengthening of social cohesion among the residents of this agricultural community.

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Urban gardens of Amman
Building resilience in local communities

Urban gardening has a positive impact on the economy, the environment and food security. An important component of the project initiated by the Greater Amman Municipality (Jordan) was the training of the local population to raise their awareness of the importance and potential of urban gardening.

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First planning steps for a pilot composting plant
In Quito, Ecuador, organic waste will soon be composted and thus recycled

In the Ecuadorian capital Quito, 2,000 tons of waste are generated every day. Almost 50 percent of the waste is organic material that decomposes with high greenhouse gas emissions. Waste management experts from Quito and Hamburg now designed a first pilot composting plant for organic waste. It intends to serve the city of Quito as an introduction to sustainable waste recycling. The collaboration was successfully initiated by Connective Cities. 

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Municipal and citizen engagement for the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
The Colombian city of Manizales focuses on strategic and grassroots localisation of the 2030 Agenda

What is the best way to bring the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) closer to the population as a real-life necessity and to integrate them into people's everyday lives? The Colombian city of Manizales faced this question and found its way through a Connective Cities learning process.

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Voices from Connective Cities – Hebron municipality
THIS VIDEO IS THE FIRST OF TEN VIDEOS IN OUR NEW SERIES "VOICES OF CONNECTIVE CITIES – THE MENA REGION".

Representatives of the Hebron Municipality talk about how they have benefited from the exchange with other experts at the events and workshops organised by Connective Cities. They were able to take away many ideas for their own projects in the field of gender-responsive digitalisation of administrative processes and in the field of energy efficiency and improve their implementation.

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FRANKFURT (ODER) - SŁUBICE: STANDING TOGETHER TO fight THE PANDEMIC
VIDEO ABOUT CROSS-BORDER SOLIDARITY BETWEEN FRANKFURT (ODER), GERMANY AND SŁUBICE, POLAND.

The COVID-19 pandemic had a great influence on the lives of people in the sister cities of Słubice and Frankfurt (Oder). Especially citizens who regularly commuted to the neighbouring city were affected by the restrictions. Despite these obstacles, joint decisions by the two municipalities succeeded in further strengthening social cohesion across borders.

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Outlook
Overcoming obstacles to the implementation of green infrastructure
third session of the mini-series on planning sustainable infrastructure on 08 JUNE 2022, 14:00 - 16:00 CEST

There are already many innovative policies and practices at the local level when it comes to sustainable urban planning, urban greening and land use, and ecosystem-based management practices. However, there is often a lack of systematic implementation of green urban infrastructure. Join us for a discussion on approaches to overcome the implementation gaps.

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Securing Development Gains among Multidimensional Risks
Insight Moment on the topic of Risk Informed Urban Development on 10 June 2022, 16:00 - 17:00 CEST

Cities have become the centers human activity and thus there is a confluence of risks at the urban level. These risks are no longer a standalone matter but are increasingly interconnected and more and more systemic. How can risks be assessed, mitigated and how can development gains be secured? Join our virtual event with an input by Mr. Rajeev Issar from UNDP. 

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Dynamic vulnerability
Insight Moment on the topic of Risk Informed Urban Development on 14 June 2022, 14:30 - 15:30 CEST

Vulnerability is a key concept within Climate Change and Disaster Risk Management and is often the first step towards the planning of any disaster mitigating or climate adaptation measures. Therefore it is important to fully understand the dynamics of vulnerability. Join our virtual event with Mr. Juan Camilo Gomez-Zapata from GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences in Potsdam. 

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Connective Cities Learning process: Bringing the Sustainable Development Goals closer to the citizens
Connective Cities event at the World Urban Forum on 30 June 2022, 15:00 - 15:45 CEST

The international community of practice Connective Cities will present its learning formats for sustainable urban development at the World Urban Forum (WUF) in Katowice, Poland. Representatives of the cities of Bonn and Manizales will report on their experiences at a virtual dialogue event and the implementation of their ideas on site. The session will take place in the German Pavilion and can also be attended online. 

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