Project / Initiative
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UrbanGreenLeap
Advancing Green Infrastructure in Small and Medium Cities
The UrbanGreenLeap project will help small and medium-sized Mediterranean cities promote climate change adaptation, disaster risk prevention and resilience, as an increasing number of cities face challenges related to climate change, pollution and overdevelopment. The project is expected to deliver several key outcomes, including strategies to enhance professional competence in urban greening, the development of six Urban Nature Plans, and the implementation of pilot actions to test and scale up sustainable practices.
The project addresses common territorial challenges of the program area:
1. The growth and densification of urbanised areas at the expense of green areas coupled with frequent heatwaves and meteorological extreme events is causing unwanted consequences, such as surplus mortality during summer months, lower air quality, urban heat island effects, urban floods and habitat fragmentation.
2. Spaces for urban nature and greening as well as spaces for public use and community activities are getting rare in quantity, and/or in quality.
3. Climate change with extreme temperatures and weather conditions causes stress to urban nature, harms the health of plants and their ecosystems, loss of biodiversity and reduction of the ecosystem functions of urban green areas.
4. Climate change simultaneously harms green areas and increases the needs of the city environment and residents for the functions of green areas, so cities must protect and develop their green areas and, in addition, green the urban environment with ambition.st effectively protect and develop their green areas and additionally ambitiously green the urban environment.
5. Local authorities and public service in small-medium towns don’t have the competencies and experiences regarding green space protection and development and grening of living areas.
Project objective
The project aims to strengthen the capacity of local authorities to manage green spaces sustainably, promote citizen participation, develop Urban Nature Plans to integrate biodiversity and strengthen urban green infrastructure to reduce the impact of climate change.
Project actions
UrbanGreenLeap has been designed to provide integrated, innovative and practical solutions to challenges. First, the project contributes to redesigning green spaces and improving ecosystem functions for people by improving the knowledge, and capacities of the relevant staff of local authorities and by making available a range of tools, practises and methods (to be developed, tested and validated in the frame of the project). Secondly project, helps city practitioners involve the citizens in the practice and empower them to participate in daily routines and further coordinated and independent actions, to change the behaviour of citizens by providing specific solutions they can use. Finally, the project also tackles the third obstacle – the limited commitment of decision-makers to strategic planning and participatory practice of design and management of urban green space by helping to raise the awareness of their local decision-makers.
TOTAL BUDGET: 2.388.555 EUROS
