Environment and urban sustainability
The European Academy of the Urban Environment EA.UE in 2006

Europe has long ago grown and developed far beyond a mere Common Market and the single European market. Political integration is progressing - sometimes rapidly, sometimes more slowly. For European citizens this can be experienced in particular in towns and cities.
Towns and cities form the basis of European society, they are vital centres of knowledge and culture; they have available tremendous economic and social resources. Further integration in Europe will be expressed in concrete terms in urban areas, the dynamism and pace of Europe in these locations will prove itself; however, here too, the difficulties can be experienced.

European local government bodies are confronted by tremendous challenges which can only be faced within a European context:
Conditions and quality of life for the average citizen need to be further improved and organised in a more healthy way. Admittedly, this includes technical factors as well, nevertheless, at local authority level more sustainable, integrated and participatory management approaches and decision-making processes are by far more significant.

Demography and composition of the population in a number of European countries will change dramatically and rapidly. Decline in population in inner cities as a result of the declining birth rate and urban sprawl is at the time of writing a widespread phenomenon which will increase even further in the next number of years. At the same time, the proportion of persons with an immigrant background is growing. Urban areas are thus facing tremendous tasks in with regard to integration. This development process too will become more pronounced in the next few years.
It is a requirement of END, the EU environmental noise directive, which came into force in 2002 and was transposed into German legislation at the end of 2005, that major cities and agglomerations commence action planning for noise abatement with considerable public participation in 2008. However, so far, local authorities in Germany have little experience in this field..

Thus these three trends and tasks confronting municipalities formed the programmatic points of main emphasis for the European Academy of the Urban Environment in the year 2006.

Demographic change and immigration - new challenges confronting towns and cities

In the coming decades the population of Europe will decline considerably. Some countries - in the first place Germany and Bulgaria - will in the next four decades lose up to 30 per cent of their population; the proportion of elderly inhabitants will then amount to more than one-third of the total population, children and young people in some countries will constitute only a small minority of not even 15 per cent.

However, this demographic change will not occur everywhere to the same degree. Western and northern Europe will be barely affected, or comparatively speaking only to a small degree, but central and southern Europe will thus be more gravely affected. In addition to economic disparities, which in the views of several economic experts will increase, there will be greater demographic differences. Unless countermeasures are taken these two developments will be mutually reinforcing. How will Europe then be able to compete in the commercial field with the USA, where in a few decades the population will be on average 10 years younger and furthermore will outstrip the 'old' continent in terms of population numbers?

In a number of member states these developments may well increase the gap between rich and poor, and the risk of crossing the poverty line will increase for wider sections or groups in these societies, thus ultimately endangering the legitimacy of Europe and its institutions. Even now, the proportion of sections of society near the poverty line is in some countries as high as one-third of the population; this figure can only be reduced by means of social transfer payments to 25 per cent. In other member states - such as Germany - the gap between lower and upper income groups has widened considerably in the last number of years.

Not only does demographic change have an impact on economic development - and incidentally, on national budgets too - it will also make provision of public services and utilities in particular at local level considerably more expensive - or of lower quality. The fact that many schools in Brandenburg or Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania have been closed because inhabitants have moved away, for example, or even simply increases in water and sewage charges due to noticeably higher demand for cleaning and flushing water highlight the aspects which may await some cities and towns. Will inhabitants be prepared to play their part in this?

One instrument which might mitigate the numerical decline and increase in proportions of elderly people in the population is that of labour migration. The point is not only made in the Commission green paper "Confronting demographic change: a new solidarity between the generations" (2005), ministers responsible for home affairs of a number of larger EU member states referred to the idea in their meeting at Stratford-upon-Avon at the end of October 2006. Whether the idea of 'circular migration', i.e. immigration (to Europe) which is limited to a specific number of years, will meet with any degree of success, may nevertheless - in view of German experience over the 'green card' - give reason to doubt. At any rate, immigration is no longer a political 'non-word', and the most recent Commission communication (10/2006) on demographic change calls on Europe to "use the opportunities offered by immigration". But - as developments/situations in particular in Germany, France, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom have shown - this idea must be put over to the general public.

Thus towns and cities - the 'target areas' for immigration - are facing considerable tasks with regard to integration. Due to differing social value concepts, relationships and differences in family structures, there will be changes in the demands made of local level provision of services and support. This will have impacts on social and physical infrastructure aspects - such as schools, kindergartens, parks and green spaces, the housing market or transport systems, and so on.

Migration, immigration and cultural integration in the European city

The publication entitled "Migration and Cultural Inclusion in the European City" (published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2006) formed the culmination of a project dealing with integration of cultural and ethnic groups in European towns and cities; in this field EA.UE has collaborated for the past five years with Queen's University Belfast and University College Dublin. Academic specialists and practitioners have analysed integration policy in eight EU member states and specified differing approaches as exemplified by a number of selected cities. Europe is far from applying unified policies in migration and integration. The spectrum ranges from negation and suppression of immigration - and thus of concomitant integration policy - through political announcements characterised by euphemisms, on to a national 'laissez-faire' attitude, and the hope that in a multi-cultural society living and working together and integration would take care of themselves.

Political decisions in the last few years have been determined more by 'national upheavals' - for example, in the Federal Republic the PISA education study results, disturbances in France, murders of politicians and film directors in the Netherlands, terrorist attacks on buses and underground trains in the UK - than guided by concrete facts about figures and situations with respect to immigrants. The problem starts right from a realisation that more is known about hens and cows on European farms than about 'immigrants'. There are no reliable figures about such people. When the results of the micro-census were published in the summer of 2006, suddenly it seemed there were double the number of people with an immigrant background in Germany; official figures or statistics on major cities in the Netherlands refer to between ten and fifteen per cent with an immigrant background, but academic studies take as a starting point at least forty per cent; France publishes statistics only at irregular intervals and very tentatively ... Well-founded immigration policy in Europe, arrived at by consent of all concerned, can only be achieved in such conditions with extreme difficulty - however, bearing in mind the efforts of the European Commission and several MS to encourage labour migration in the next few years for economic reasons, is nevertheless absolutely imperative.

Yet in some towns and cities there are successful and promising approaches in existence. They bring together social, ethnic and spatial planning programmes and instruments, and are distinguished in the main by considerable efforts made to inform and actively increase participation by inhabitants. One thing is clear (and in this point nearly all the authors represented agree): Europe, its member states, its towns and cities need open discussion on the objectives of integration, on shared or common norms and values, on how to shape the future. One problem which this involves for us 'native (or born) Europeans' is that we are no longer the only Europeans who are carrying on and steering this discourse.

Prosperity, Mobility and Demographic Change in European Cities

Impacts of low birth rates and an ageing population, effects of shrinking cities can be visualised in several federal states in the eastern part of the Federal Republic. Schools are being closed, railway routes taken out of service, towns and cities are becoming deserted ... The potential consequences of demographic change have long been a topic in spatial planning, however, in traffic and transport planning so far the questions have hardly been under consideration. Demographers, physical and traffic planners, and the traffic and transport industry, need to work more together than has so far been the case, so that using appropriate methods foreseeable developments can be described, with appropriate spatial and chronological differentiations, and from this concrete planning ideas can be derived. In view of the long-term effects of physical - and thus precisely of traffic-related - infrastructure features, it is therefore necessary for a 'paradigm shift' to occur.

As to the question(s) of how local authority budgets, or how prosperity/affluence amongst the (ordinary) citizens might change under the influence of demographic change, and what effect/impacts/influence this will have on urban mobility and traffic and transport planning, this is currently being examined in the framework of a project jointly organised with the Technical University of Berlin and with the financial support of the Regional Ministry (Senate Department) of Urban Development as part of the EU Town Twinning programme. Two international conferences, directed towards twinned local authorities, cities and towns of Berlin and the city's urban districts (boroughs), a questionnaire process, the evaluation of responses and a culminating publication are designed to play a part in finding initial responses/answers to these questions and to make local decision makers aware of the problem / increase awareness in local decison makers for the problem(s).

By means of this project which commenced in 2006 and will be concluded in the course of 2007, further activities from the previous years will be continued, with the aim of examining the influence of demographic change on European municipalities and to increase awareness OF IT.

Thinking and acting in integrated ways - mainstreaming sustainable development as a task for European municipalities 

Sustainable development is a cross-sectoral task for towns and cities / local authorities in Europe which can only be brought about in an intensive dialogue with the population / the citizens / the inhabitants. In order to achieve this, it is vital to have cooperation, indeed integration of the wide variety of local authority fields of action and tasks.

Calls for vertical and horizontal integration and for greater public participation in order to deal with tasks relating to for the future have been formulated, ever since the Rio Declaration of 1992, in various policy announcements and documents. Currently this trend is being picked up again, for example, in the context of the EU Thematic Strategy on the Urban Environment, and also in the 7th Framework Programme. In the meantime it has become political common knowledge, without which hardly any announcement on sutainable development is complete.

However, reality still looks somewhar different / This is far from being the case in practice. One sees / Here there are health policy makers complaining about noise and air pollution, spatial planners are concerned about urban sprawl, politicians about inner cities being deserted. At the same time/In parallel roads are being built and widened, new housing estates are set up on the far outskirts of towns or cities and trading or commercial sites are given planning permission out in the open countryside / on green field sites.

Within the scope of THE PEPP, a UNECE / WHO Europe programme - which was funded by the Federal Environmental Agency - a project was organised which aimed to idnetify institutional key/crucial conditions/parameters making possible horizontal and vertical integration of the fields of environment, health and transport at both local and higher level authorities. This objective was based on the realisation/awareness that due to increase in physical size of towns and cities and to urban sprawl / overdevelopment (occuring regional and chronologically very uneven) changes in European settlement structures IN Europe will mean / result in changes in traffic and transport situation(s) and further health pressures and environmental pollution. These negative consequences/impacts may, this has been shown in a variety of case studies, at least be relieved/mitigated by means of integrated, participatory planning and problem solution/ solVING approaches.

The results of an investigation and of an international conference were submitted to the Federal Environmental Agency in the form of a condensed study and have been incorporated into the UNECE / WHO Europe programme.

Public participation in local level noise abatement

Adverse health and economic effects as a result of noise - despite the fact that the relative evaluations differ depending on which study - are nevertheless considerable. Noise is perceived by the general public as one of the most important aspects of environmental  pollution and in surveys on day-to-day / everyday environmental problems is nearly always in the number one slot/at the top of the list. At the same time these studies and surveys also point out that the public feels they are frequently left on their own with "their noise problems".

Although elements/questions in noise protection and noise abatement have figured/entered more prominently/clearly in/to the consciousness/awareness (and actions/behaviour) amongst political persons and public authorities in the last few years, nevertheless noise abatement/remediation remains to a large extent a "sectoral task" on the basis of legislative regulations which are distributed ?evenly throughout the Law and Regulation scene / pattern of the Federal and regional competences in Germany. In the foreseeable future it seems that the revised (up-dated) Federal Law on control of pollution (Bundesimmissionsschutzgesetz) to take account of the EU Environmental Noise Directive - amongst other factors due to time limits und processes involved - will not change this situation very much.

On the other hand, the Environmental Noise Directive has played its part in positioning noise protection or abatement more prominently/firmly in politics or policy discussion!! (also - and in particular - in larger conurbations/towns and cities), to bring it more effectively into public debate and public information as a task for public authorities and other (?administrative) bodies and (furthermore) to perceive noise abatement in addition more and more as a cross-sectoral task. In particular, this is a crucial task confronting local authority bodies / local government / towns and cities.

Combatting noise pollution thus remains a primary environment policy task, but in addition is also a task for society as a whole. In this respect, major importance is to be attached to the public participation which is required in the EU directive, and to an exchange of views between all the players, in order to bring about a noise-reduced/low-noise, more healthy working and living environment and to lobby for noise abatement.
In conjunction with the consultancy company Lärmkontor of Hamburg, EA.UE held an international conference addressing the implementation of the environmental noise directive and at the end of the year commenced work on the "Silent City" project with Federal Environment Agency funding, which will run until 2008.

The objective of "Silent City" is to evaluate local level approaches to noise abatement and public participation, to trial a number of methods and instruments in selected towns and cities and to elaborate information packs and recommendations for policy making and administrative bodies.