Managing urban dynamics in old industrial cities - Lessons learned on revitalising inner-city industrial sites in six European case studies

For many European cities structural economic changes have a tremendous impact on the city's image, labour force and the spatial and (socio-) economic framework. City administrations are struggling with industries becoming obsolete or moving elsewhere and leaving derelict and often contaminated sites in the core of the city. The cities have to cope with the consequences, such as social decay, joblessness and environmental contamination. Revitalising derelict inner city sites is essential for a sustainable urban development, because it improves the image of the site and its neighbourhoods, it helps reduce sprawl on the urban fringe and it enhances environmental quality. Although cities could derive multiple benefits from reusing those sites, a revitalisation is afflicted with many risks and uncertainties and therefore represents a major challenge for a city. This paper presents experiences gained and lessons learned in six different revitalisation case studies in Gothenburg (S), Liverpool (GB), Lisbon (P), Berlin (D), Steyr (A) and Barcelona (ES). The research was conducted within the EU project MASURIN (Management of Sustainable Revitalisation of Urban Industrial Sites, EVK4-CT-2001-00054). The cases researched demonstrate that certain key factors and approaches need to be in place that allow cities to redevelop old industrial sites in a sustainable manner. In complex systems such as cities local circumstances, stakeholders' views and the types of organisations involved play a major role. The cases illustrate that open communication, trust and cooperation between public and private stakeholders accelerate the revitalisation process and lead to a balanced and mutually accepted outcome. Following a holistic concept and a vision, but staying flexible throughout the process helps create resilient structures, which strengthen the urban fabric and essentially contribute to a sustainable development of the whole city

Innovative Approaches to Integrative Energy Planning – Experiences and Results from the EU Project Urban Learning

Many cities in Europe and worldwide are searching for answers and effective approaches to the challenges of implementing ambitious climate objectives in liberalised energy markets while having to accomodate growing populations. Providing new infrastructure, jobs and affordable housing for city dwellers in urban areas offers unique chances for introducing renewables and largely decarbonised energy systems. At the same time, cities struggle with high building costs, urban planning approaches that only partially factor in energy planning as well as governance systems that would require much more collaboration and cooperation between key stakeholders involved in urban energy planning. The EU project Urban Learning (March 2015 – November 2017) involved seven capital cities across Europe (Vienna, Berlin, Paris, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Warsaw and Zagreb) as well as the City of Zaanstad (NL) and focused on enhancing their capacity to work towards integrative energy planning through improved governance processes. All cities concentrated their efforts on improving governance processes in new development and transformation areas to fulfill their commitments for reducing the consumption of fossil fuels and to respond to the immediate pressure of population growth. The consortium analysed innovative technical solutions and their implications for planning processes, evaluated existing instruments and tools and explored ways to develop governance solutions that contribute to more effective integrative energy planning. In order to improve communication and interdepartmental exchange between key stakeholders from e.g. planning, sustainability or environmental departments, each partner city installed a so called Local Working Group. Intrinsic to the project design was a strong emphasis on learning from each other and on exchanging insights, barriers and lessons learned regularly between members of the consortium, with local working group members and with other associated cities from all partner countries throughout the entire project period. After 33 months of collaboration, a number of insights and results surfaced that can be passed on to other cities facing similar hurdles and wanting to improve their own (integrative) energy planning practices and capacities. Without a clear legal base and strategy for energy planning, integrating energy and urban planning will not work. Clear, long-term decarbonisation strategies further support cities’ paths toward achieving more integrated energy planning. It also showed that more awareness is required about the need for public energy planning competences in city administrations and beyond. A key success factor includes a constantly high level of cooperation and collaboration among and across city departments and with stakeholders such as energy system operators, energy suppliers, developers and planners. This paper describes lessons learned, insights and results from the Urban Learning project highlighting concrete examples from different partner cities

Indicators for Water Information Systems

Abstract The basic role of indicator systems is the structured provision of information for decisions from observation and readings. The development of Indicator systems for the water management is an interdisciplinary task which contains technical, organizational and mental aspects. Despite the impulses of the European water framework directive for indicator harmonization, a need for an efficient design of the waters management and for methods for the integration of data of different qualities can be expected. By the combination of system analytical methods with operative methods of the database management as well as suitable organizational measures, in the long run the requirements of the European water framework directive can be fulfilled in the constraints of the existing financial and personnel framework conditions

45th Congress of the European Regional Science Association -Land Use and Water Management in a Sustainable Network Society -Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Managing urban dynamics in old industrial cities: Lessons learned on revitalising inner-city industria

Abstract In many European cities structural economic changes have a tremendous impact on a city's image, labour force and the spatial and (socio-) economic framework. City administrations are struggling with industries becoming obsolete or moving elsewhere and leaving derelict and often contaminated sites in the core of the city. The cities have to cope with consequences such as social decay, joblessness and environmental contamination. Revitalising derelict inner city sites is essential for a sustainable urban development, because it improves the image of the site and its neighbourhoods, it helps reduce sprawl on the urban fringe and it enhances environmental quality. Although cities could derive multiple benefits from reusing those sites, a revitalisation is afflicted with many risks and uncertainties and therefore represents a major challenge for a city. This paper presents experiences gained and lessons learned in six different revitalisation case studies in Gothenburg (S), Liverpool (GB), Lisbon (P), Berlin (D), Steyr (A) and Barcelona (ES). The research was conducted within the EU project MASURIN (Management of Sustainable Revitalisation of Urban Industrial Sites, EVK4- CT-2001-00054). The cases researched demonstrate that certain key factors and approaches need to be in place that allow cities to redevelop old industrial sites in a sustainable manner. In complex systems such as cities local circumstances, stakeholders' views and the types of organisations involved play a major role. The cases illustrate that open communication, trust and cooperation between public and private stakeholders accelerate the revitalisation process and lead to a balanced and mutually accepted outcome. Following a holistic concept and a vision, but staying flexible throughout the process helps create resilient structures, which strengthen the urban fabric and essentially contribute to a sustainable development of the entire city