Sustainable cities

by Paul Csagoly

Urban Appetite
The European Environment Agency (EEA) estimates that an average European city of 1 million inhabitants requires 11,500 tonnes of fossil fuels, 320,000 tonnes of water and 2,000 tonnes of food every day. It also produces 300,000 tonnes of wastewater, 25,000 tonnes of carbon dioxide and 1,600 tonnes of solid waste daily.

The result is an increasingly long list of environmental stresses — loss of green areas, poor air quality and increased energy use — to name a few. Stress due to increased car transport, which rose by 5.5 percent in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) in 1994 alone, is a particularly aggravating problem, says the EEA.

In Katowice, Poland (population 350,000), local authorities are searching for investors to modernise their public tram lines. And while construction of a modern hospital waste plant is praised as a local success story, the city's old sewage system continues to flood basements, used tires are piling up and urban green space is limited. "The challenges require enormous sums of money, new technologies and international aid," said Piotr Uszok of the City Council of Katowice.

European cities and towns campaign
A major response to urban stress in Europe, including CEE, is the European Cities and Towns Campaign, a Europe-wide initiative involving over 400 local authorities, including Katowice. The main goal of the campaign is to foster sustainable cities through Local Agenda 21 actions among its members.

Local Agenda 21 is a plan for keeping a municipality's future economic development in harmony with its environmental and social needs and limitations. The importance of Local Agenda 21 for cities and towns was highlighted in Chapter 28 of Agenda 21, the landmark document that came out of the 1992 UN World Environment and Development Conference. Chapter 28 stated that "local authorities in each country should have undertaken a consultative process with their population and achieved a consensus on a Local Agenda 21 for their community" by 1996.

The European Cities and Towns Campaign was launched in May 1994 at the First European Conference on Sustainable Cities and Towns in Aalborg, Denmark. Eighty authorities signed the Aalborg Charter, committing themselves to long-term action plans toward sustainability and implementing Local Agenda 21 processes. Twenty-nine CEE and NIS municipalities have now signed the Aalborg Charter from Tirana, Albania to Tartu, Estonia.

The Second European Sustainable Cities conference was held in Lisbon in 1996, attracting over 1,000 local and regional representatives who assessed progress made since Aalborg and agreed on the Lisbon Action Plan. In Lisbon, the decision to hold four regional conferences, in order to better understand the specific urban problems of the north south, east and west European regions, was also made. The conference covering CEE, Southeast Europe and NIS, was held in Sofia, Bulgaria in 1999.

Urban Sustainability in CEE
The Sofia conference, Towards Local Sustainability in Central and Eastern Europe, attracted some 280 municipal representatives and environmental experts from 70 cities and 30 countries. Objectives were two-fold. The first was to look at current local sustainable development initiatives and stimulate new ones in the CEE region. The second was to raise awareness of the local implications of EU accession and EU funding opportunities. The conference was also a place for CEE and NIS cities and towns to talk about their common local problems and strategies.

Conference participants composed the Sofia Statement (see below) a set of priority issues and recommendations to guide their sustainable development work into the future.

Examples of successful practices, such as Bulgaria's Municipal Energy Efficiency Network, EcoEnergy, were introduced. Among its activities, this association promotes local energy-saving policies, influences national energy policy and disseminates information about energy-efficient technologies.

As part of Bulgaria's Capacity 21 Programme for Sustainable Development, the communities of Velingrad and Asenovgrad were selected for Local Agenda 21 pilot projects. "The process itself helped them to build their self-confidence and local capacities to define their own visions and strategies," said national programme coordinator Tanya Shoumkova. Local actions included public hearings and workshops on communications skills and sustainable agriculture.

In line with the EC's push for subsidiarity, conference participants emphasised that local authorities need adequate powers delegated to them from the state to effectively implement sustainable development. "Europe should respect the principle of subsidiarity and decisions should be made as close as possible to local citizens," said Dimitrios Avramopoulos, Mayor of Athens.

Partnerships between east and west are a common Local Agenda 21 strategy, such as that between the provincial government of Carinthia, Austria, and the city of Chernovtsy, Ukraine. As a result, a EUR 35-million plan was drawn up for resolving Chernovtsy's water problems, which result mainly from organic pollutants in the local Dniester River.

In the end, conference delegates recognised that sustainability requires fundamental changes in human attitudes and behaviour, which requires time and energy. The Chernovtsy plan, however, highlighted another important barrier to implementing sustainable development in CEE: money.

The Sofia Statement
Selected key policies and issues made by urban representatives after the conference:

• The vital role of local authorities in designing and implementing national and international sustainable development strategies is emphasised.

• We will strive for democratic institutions and more public participation. NGOs continue to have a crucial role in the process.

• Unequal access to resources and power during the transition period has increased social disparities. Appealing but unsustainable patterns must be avoided.

• 29 CEE municipalities have adopted the Aalborg Charter and joined the Sustainable Cities and Towns Campaign.

• We will create more sustainable infrastructures and services, such as separate waste collection and co-generation, and try to stop urban sprawl and increased road traffic.

• We call on national governments to ensure local self-governance and its corresponding powers and resources according to the principle of subsidiarity.

• We need continued financial support from abroad and a mutual exchange of experiences.