From May 21 to 25, the European Green Week took place not only in Brussels, but also in other cities in Europe – including Valladolid, one of Urban GreenUP’s frontrunner cities. This year’s theme was “Green cities for a greener future.
As part of Urban GreenUP’s activities, the municipality of Valladolid organised a competition called, “Renaturing your city”, where the public was invited to propose ideas on re-naturalization the city’s urban areas. Participants needed to accompany their idea by any type of visual media such as models, posters, collages, and pictures. Their works were judged according to their originality, their applicability or impact on society, their quality, their design and their sustainability.
More than 1,000 people from schools and colleges, associations and professional boards were invited to join the contest. Winners from different categories were announced during an awarding ceremony that took place the 25th of May at the facilities of the municipality’s Agencia de Innovación y Desarrollo Económico.
Under the “civic groups” category, the premium award was given to the ARTENCANAL association for their work called, “NENÚFAR”. They proposed on reducing water accumulation at the avenues of Cuesta de la Maruquesa by capturing water and purifying it via a rain garden and a filtering pavement, respectively. Second place was given to the Asociación para la Conservación y Estudio de la Naturaleza de Valladolid (ACENVA) that presented their work called, “INSECTICIDAS NATURALES”. They presented an infographics that suggests the installation of nests for swifts and shelters for bats in order to raise the biodiversity in the city.
Winners under the “schools” category were high school students from I.E.S. Pinar de la Rubia and I.E.S. Parquesol, who proposed the ideas, “ASPERDOLID” and “WATERLID”, respectively. The previous proposal suggested the installation of an intelligent system in Parque Alameda using the water from the collected rainwater. The latter idea looked at equipping the urban gardens of the Santos Pilarica neighbourhood with rainwater tanks.
As NBSs need a lot of creativity, this type of activity showed the possibility of igniting the imagination of Valladolid’s community. It did not only raise their awareness on the NBSs that Urban GreenUP plans to do in their city as it also allowed the idea of “re-naturing one’s own city” a more tangible reality to get hold of.