Impact created by GovernEUR

In cities the effects of climate change are increasingly noticeable think of heavy shower weather and heat. At the same time the number of city dwellers is growing, and the city is becoming more ‘urbanized’: more and more buildings are being built in the form of bricks, asphalt and concrete which means that rainwater cannot drain away properly and heat remains trapped. It is therefore important to make cities more climate proof.

To achieve this, it is essential that various parties such as the municipality and the water board work together to stimulate neighborhood initiatives, the gardening industry, housing corporations and real estate developers. Urban climate adaptation is in fact a responsibility of public, social and private parties alike. Networks to connect these parties are necessary.

GovernEUR, together with the Department of Public Administration at Erasmus University, conducted research into Amsterdam Rainproof and Water Sensitive Rotterdam. These are platforms on the edge of the government organization that facilitate urban climate adaptation. They are loosely connected to the government and therefore know how to connect well with parties from the city. “We call these platforms boundary objects. Border objects have their own identity that suits different parties and so it forms a connection between these parties, with new collaborations and new results,” explains Jitske van Popering-Verkerk, Researcher and Managing Director of GovernEUR.

“Using the research results we developed a roadmap with ten lessons on success factors and barriers with the aim of learning how their approach can be generalized. This roadmap shows what governments can do to work with other parties to make the city more beautiful and climate-proof,” says Jitske.

“The roadmap is also of interest to other governments and will be applied to several municipalities and water boards in the future. In this way we are trying to translate very concrete results into an applicable road map. The roadmap helps many cities and places to set up networks around climate adaptation. And we see that this roadmap has sparked attention for new ways of working at the edge of the organization “, concludes Jitske.