The partners of the URBAN GreenUP project have gathered in the fellow Front-Runner city of Liverpool to report on the progress made since their last encounter in Izmir on January this year. They also exchanged ideas and coordinated in planning for their future work. In particular, URBAN GreenUP Front-Runner cities gave an update on the local implementation of Nature-Based Solutions (NBS).
Over the past months, the Liverpool team have worked on agreeing and identifying a range of NBS interventions for the Baltic corridor. These included the installation of a green wall, provision of cooling trees and green screens, construction of a rain garden and plan on creating a floating island in the dock. They have also investigated other possible NBS to be implemented in the Otterspool and Jericho demonstration areas, including the installation of a sustainable urban drainage system that will control and reduce localised flooding.
As for Valladolid, a lot of the work carried out focused mainly on green infrastructure installations. These included the installations of the green shade and lighting awnings in the streets of Santa María and Zuñiga, the vegetation cover for the canopies in Plaza España, and the green roof in El Campillo Market. Furthermore, hydrological and hydraulic studies for the local floodable park have been carried out.
Work has also been done in Izmir with regards to the tendering process for climate-smart urban farming, restoration of the Peynircioğlu Stream and the construction of the green corridor. In the next months, parklets, green resting units, green shelters and pollinator houses will be co-designed and co-produced via a city-wide design workshop in collaboration with universities, civic organizations and professional chambers of related disciplines.
This project meeting provided the occasion for the Consortium to establish formally the URBAN GreenUP Cluster of Cities. The Cluster’s members (Front-Runner and Follower Cities, FundaciónCartif, Sociedade Portuguesa de Inovacao, RMIT University, Fondazione iCons and the Bocconi University) signed a letter stating their commitment to pursue a number of common objectives. Examples are the promotion of widespread acceptance, awareness, replication and dissemination of the Re-naturing Urban Plan methodology and of the individual NBS implemented in URBAN GreenUP, and contributing to the creation of a wider community of interest on NBS. Establishing the Cluster is the first step towards creating a larger Network of European and extra-European cities that are willing to re-nature their current urban landscapes by following URBAN GreenUP’s methodology.
With all that’s been said and done, the 3rd periodic meeting turned out to be a very productive experience, and confirmed the great progress made during the project’s first year of activity.
30 July 2018