Executive Summary

The Thematic Strategy on the Urban Environment is one of the key actions outlined in the 6th Community Environment Action Programme and is to be presented to the European Parliament and the Council in 2005. Four priority themes have been identified for the Thematic Strategy on the Urban Environment, and independent working groups have been established on each of these four themes. They are:

• Sustainable Urban Transport
• Sustainable Urban Management
• Sustainable Urban Design
• Sustainable Urban Construction

The 4 WGs produced their Interim Reports in July/August 2003. Their final reports were presented in spring 2004. The working groups have been tasked to answer four basic questions:

• What is 'best practice'?
• Why isn't every urban area using best practice techniques?
• What can be done to overcome these problems?
• What can Europe do to overcome these problems?

It was the aim of these four WGs to work out recommendations for the many and various levels of action and for a variety of players. This was to take place on the basis of analysis of the problems and of the barriers in the four thematic areas.

DG Environment of the European Commission awarded a service contract to the European Academy of the Urban Environment (EA.UE) to prepare an Overview Report on the urban situation for each of 12 Candidate Countries, which was presented in July 2003, and an Analysis Report, which reflects on Working Group findings and their relevance for the Candidate Countries. The interim version of the Analysis Report was presented in September 2003.

The final Analysis Report here presented is structured as follows:

• The results of the four WGs have been synoptically summarised and compared in chapter 1 according to the following points: definitions and visions of sustainability; problems and trends; state of the art / best (good) practices; barriers; recommendations (in general addressed to EU / EC level); indicators, targets and monitoring; EU programmes.
• There follows an overview of urban problem areas in the candidate countries. In addition the most significant barriers to more sustainable urban development are elaborated and examples of good practice in urban development are presented (chapter 2). These case studies have been evaluated with regard to their objectives and to the barriers with which the projects were confronted. The Candidate Countries' Report, submitted in July 2003, is used as a basis for this process, and from this indications have been derived in order to rank the proposed fields of action which are given in chapter 4.
• A number of EU programmes which are of relevance for the four thematic areas are considered in chapter 3. In addition, the recommendations contained in the Communication "Towards a thematic strategy on the urban environment" dated 11 February 2004 (COM(2004)60) have been summarised and analysed with regard to their significance for candidate countries.
• Chapter 4 consists of – as it were emanating from chapter 2 – a series of general and over-arching recommendations which are directed primarily to the Commission/Community level. These recommendations have been compared with the results in the final reports of the four WGs and with the Communication "Towards a thematic strategy on the urban environment", which to a certain degree they complement. The generic recommendations are amplified by a number of more specific recommendations in the four thematic areas; they are a synopsis formed from results of interviews carried out as part of the compilation for the Twelve Candidate Country Overview Report which was submitted in July 2003.

At this point the most crucial results in this Analysis Report will be summarised below.

WG results and recommendations

Disregarding all the recommendations which are specific to one or other of the themes, it is clear that there are large areas of congruence in the WG recommendations. These points refer in the first instance to those areas in particular (they are grouped in the order of importance, which is derived from comparisons between the WG reports):

• capacity building and increase in commitment / dissemination and exchange of experience
• national / EU-wide action plans / standards / guidance
• national / EU funds / funding
• improving vertical and sectoral cooperation
• improving data availability / monitoring, benchmarking
• improving EU monitoring and report system(s)
• use and improvement of innovative tools and instruments
• innovative fiscal instruments
• improving horizontal, integrated cooperation
• increasing public awareness
• coherence between EU policies
• improving cooperation beyond administrative boundaries
• public-private partnership
• subsidiarity in the sense of decisions and actions taken close to the citizen/to the problem and/or at the appropriate level

EU programmes and initiatives

Most of the EU programmes referred to will be revised and reformulated in 2006. All of them offer many and various opportunities to underpin more sustainable urban development. The increased attention being given to networking, exchange of experience and public participation and stakeholder involvement in these programmes is a very positive step. In particular where the candidate countries are concerned, these aspects should in future (and in revised/re-issued programmes) be emphasised even more clearly.

There is, however, some concern that some programmes (especially those meant to support 'economic cohesion') do not necessarily support sustainable actions, and the Commission could probably do more to ensure that opportunities to address this goal are maximised. Obviously, agreed objectives (between different DGs), comparable and quantifiable targets and measurable indicators to monitor EU programmes are still not in place. Assessment criteria should also consider whether projects which are given financial support are in actual fact dependent on funding; secondly, whether frequently very short funding periods for projects which, in the broadest of meanings, concern institution and capacity building do not thereby stand diametrically in conflict with fulfilling their objectives.

If the proposed actions indicated in the Communication "Towards a thematic strategy on the urban environment" are implemented and are in future applied as criteria for EU programmes and initiatives, at least several of the concerns which are referred to may be mitigated and movement in the direction of a more sustainable urban development may be more effectively supported.

If for the time being more specific or technical proposals referring to one of the four thematic fields are left aside, it is contended that the Commission ought to increase its efforts primarily in the following areas:

In the fields of Urban Management and Urban Transport, management and action plans have been proposed for local authority areas/agglomerations with more than 0.1 million inhabitants; such plans are to be oriented in accordance with guidelines which will be developed by the Commission. As for the Sustainable Construction and Sustainable Urban Design fields, evaluation and objective-type guidelines are announced. In all four fields it is proposed to intensify acquisition of information as well as to elaborate those indicators which are still not available. An additional main point of emphasis ought to be created in action and initiatives in the areas of training / exchange of experience / capacity building / creating and raising awareness.

In this way the proposals in the Communication may be placed in accordance with the recommendations of the working groups – although it is felt that in some areas they could certainly be more concrete and driven to a greater degree by priority considerations.

Application to candidate countries

Differences in problems being faced and in barriers preventing more sustainable urban development in candidate countries and EU member states are in the majority of fields more of a quantitative than of a qualitative nature. It must be underlined, however:

• that in some cases the sheer size of a problem and the (temporal) dynamics of its development present such a huge hindrance, that in effect the problem itself becomes a barrier, and should be tackled through specific measures (in particular urban sprawl, rapidly growing private motorised transport);
• that there are some problems which exist almost exclusively in the candidate countries, and which need to be taken into account in proposals which will be made for the enlarged EU. The most severe 'special problem' are large (pre-fabricated) housing estates.

It is therefore an obvious conclusion that recommendations of the WGs and those of the Communication can to a large degree be applied to the candidate countries and to their urban environment situations. Nevertheless, if it is a question of allocating priorities to these recommendations, this may well be a different matter.

Recommendations

As far as the candidate countries are concerned, particular importance should be attached to the following fields of action (given here in the order of importance which has been derived from an evaluation of the 'Twelve Candidate Countries Overview Report' and from the examples of good practice described):

• improving sectoral, vertical and horizontal cooperation
• capacity building and training / international cooperation
• integrated plans / planning / action programmes
• overcoming financial constraints
• public participation and awareness raising / NGO involvement
• innovative tools and instruments (incl. indicators)
• improving data availability / monitoring / benchmarking
• coherence between EU policies
• public-private partnership
• subsidiarity in the sense of decisions and actions taken close to the citizen/to the problem and/or at the appropriate level

All steps towards implementation within these fields of action can also be supported and promoted at European level:

• When dealing with complex thematic areas such as urban management and planning, it would seem that 'soft laws' (such as broad, strategic Directives) can provide meaningful support frameworks for more sustainable urban development. Specific directives, on the other hand, would be – except possibly in some technical fields – unworkable and of little or no added value because of such great diversity in the extent and nature of these problems. On the other hand, soft instruments and recommendations can promote and underpin more sustainable urban development, precisely in those countries which lack to a certain extent commitment and knowledge of the 'rules of the game'.
• When considering monitoring of recommendations and of directives, it is necessary to strike a balance between efforts and fulfilment of the aims. On the one hand there is a danger that capacity and resources will be tied down unnecessarily and that the very act of reporting per se will be regarded as a sufficient criterion of implementation. On the other hand monitoring is necessary to a certain extent in order to assist developments and to keep (political) interest alive.
• Whereas up to the present time in the pre-accession preparation 'economic cohesion' was uppermost in the mind, at the very latest once the countries have joined the EU, 'social cohesion' and thus (not only economic) sustainability has necessarily to play a more central part. In particular the Structural Funds, but in addition a number of other programmes and initiatives, need to be much more firmly oriented towards sustainability criteria, and be available for urban development processes (and for 'special problems' in the candidate countries, such as large housing estates, rapid urban sprawl and private motorisation, as referred to above).
• since only some of the candidate countries will enter into full membership in May 2004, there must be well-directed harmonisation and support instruments put in place for those countries joining the EU at a later date. Otherwise there is a danger that the gap between countries will expand, making social, economic and environmental cohesion even more difficult and thus unnecessarily increasing the resulting costs.

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