SUSTAINABLE CITIES TOWARDS A GREEN, RESILIENT AND INCLUSIVE RECOVERY APPLYING THE SUSTAINABLE CITIES IMPLEMENTATION FRAMEWORK IN BULGARIA, CROATIA, POLAND, AND ROMANIA WORKING PAPER March 2022 1 The International Bank for Reconstruction and Development/ The World Bank 1818 H Street, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20433 U.S.A March 2022 Disclaimer This document is the product of work performed by World Bank staff and consultants. The findings, interpretations, and conclusions expressed in this document do not necessarily reflect the views of the Executive Directors of the World Bank or the governments they represent. The World Bank does not guarantee the accuracy of the data included in this work. The boundaries, colors, denomination, and other information shown in any map in this work do not imply any judgment on the part of The World Bank concerning the legal status of any territory or the endorsement or acceptance of such boundaries. Rights and Permissions The material in this work is subject to copyright. The World Bank encourages dissemination of its knowledge, this work may be reproduced, in whole or in part, for noncommercial purposes as long as full attribution to this work is given. Any queries on rights and licenses, including subsidiary rights, should be addressed to the Office of the Publisher, The World Bank, 1818 H Street NW, Washington, DC 20433, USA; fax: 202-522-2422; e-mail: pubrights@worldbank.org Acknowledgements This report was supported by a grant from the Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR). The World Bank team was led by Carli Bunding-Venter, Yondela Silimela and Noriko Oe. This report and related analysis were prepared by a team of experts, namely Damaris Bangean, Chiara Burlina, Leila Kabalan, Ionut Foldes, Reyna Alorro, Bogdan Topan, Ben Grebot, Piotr Kaminski, Alexandra Beatrice Nae, Pablo Vaggione, David Lerpiniere, Melody Benavidez, Zdravko Petrov, Asya Filipova, Dimitar Nachev, Ante Lakos, Mirta Vukelic, Ivica Trumbic, Clara Volintiru and Alexa Alexandra. The team would like to thank Christoph Pusch, Ellen Hamilton, Gallina Vincelette, Fabrizio Zarcone, Marcus Heinz, Anna Akhalkatsi, Jehan Arulpragasam, and Andrea Liverani for overall guidance. Appreciations are extended to Steven Jouy and Julie Biau for their administrative support, as well as the peer reviewers Narae Choi, Yuna Chun, and Catherine Lynch for their inputs. 2 ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS AAQD Ambient Air Quality Directives CEMR Council of European Municipalities and Regions CO2 Carbon dioxide CoM Covenant of Mayors DPP Disaster Protection Plans EA Environmental assessment EC European Commission EEA European Energy Agency EIA Environmental impact assessment ERDF European Regional Development Fund ESPON European Spatial Planning Observation Network EU European Union EUI European Urban Initiative EUROSTAT Statistical office of the European Union GDP Gross domestic product GFDRR Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery GHG Greenhouse gas GrCF Green Cities Framework GPSC Global Platform for Sustainable Cities ha hectare HOA Homeowners association ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability ICP-AGIR International City Partnerships Acting for Green and Inclusive Recovery. IDB Inter-American Development Bank IPA Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance ISO International Organization for Standardization ITU International Telecommunication Union JRC Joint Research Centre km kilometer MoE Ministry of Environment MSW Municipal Solid Waste MSWM Municipal Solid Waste Management 3 NECPs National Energy and Climate Plans NO2 Nitrogen dioxide NUA New Urban Agenda NWMS National Waste Management Strategy NUTS Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics OECD Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OSR Own Source Revenues O3 Ozone PM Particulate matter PPP Public private partnership R&D Research and development RBM Results-based management RFSC Reference Framework for Sustainable Cities SDGs Sustainable Development Goals SEAP Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plan SOE State-owned enterprise SUD Sustainable Urban Development SUMP Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan SWM Solid waste management UAST Urban Adaptation Support Tool UN United Nations UNDP United Nations Development Programme UNECE United Nations Economic Commission for Europe UN United Nations Human Settlement Programme Habitat USF Urban Sustainability Framework U4SSC United 4 Smart Sustainable Cities VLR Voluntary Local Review WB World Bank WFD Waste Framework Directive WHO World Health Organization WSS Water supply and sanitation 4 Table of Contents Executive Summary................................................................................................................................... 7 Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 11 The emergence of Sustainable Cities as a global theme ........................................................................ 11 European Context ................................................................................................................................... 13 Regional stakeholders, initiatives and knowledge partners ................................................................... 16 3 themes, 12 building blocks: An organizing framework for Sustainable Cities Implementation .......... 21 A simplified dashboard ........................................................................................................................... 21 First application of the Framework: City data dashboards ..................................................................... 23 Results and observations from dashboard application .......................................................................... 36 Country level observations ............................................................................................................... 37 Urban System .......................................................................................................................................... 37 Environment ........................................................................................................................................... 38 People and the Economy ........................................................................................................................ 40 Deep Dives: Key sustainability issue for cities ................................................................................... 42 Urban Form ............................................................................................................................................. 42 Municipal Solid Waste Management ...................................................................................................... 47 Air Quality ............................................................................................................................................... 56 Key findings and Recommendations ................................................................................................. 62 Moving city management systems towards results-based approaches ................................................. 62 Differentiated approaches to local capacity development .................................................................... 62 A stronger focus on financial sustainability of local governments ......................................................... 63 Enhanced vertical and horizontal cooperation ....................................................................................... 64 Data availability, monitoring and evaluation .......................................................................................... 65 Disaster Risk Management and Resilience at local level ........................................................................ 65 Annex 1: Sustainable Cities Quantitative Indicator List ......................................................................... 67 Annex 2: Qualitative Component of the Sustainable Cities Framework ................................................ 80 Annex 3: Data notes for dashboard completion in this application ....................................................... 87 Annex 4: Country level findings: Summary tables .................................................................................. 88 5 List of Figures FIGURE 1: URBAN SUSTAINABILITY FRAMEWORK - THE GLOBAL PLATFORM FOR SUSTAINABLE CITIES ...............................................13 FIGURE 2: EVOLUTION OF THE URBAN DIMENSION OF EU POLICY ..............................................................................................14 FIGURE 3: SUSTAINABLE CITIES IMPLEMENTATION FRAMEWORK (DASHBOARD REPRESENTATION)....................................................21 FIGURE 4: SAMPLE RESULT OF EU SUSTAINABLE CITIES DASHBOARD – WARSAW, POLAND ............................................................24 FIGURE 5: SAMPLE RESULT OF EU SUSTAINABLE CITIES DASHBOARD – 4 CITIES IN BULGARIA ...........................................................34 FIGURE 6: COMPARING ONE BUILDING BLOCK (ACCESS AND INCLUSION) BETWEEN BURGAS AND PLOVDIV .........................................35 FIGURE 7: EXAMPLE OF URBAN EXPANSION OVER TIME AND INTO PERI-URBAN AREAS - BUCHAREST ..................................................44 FIGURE 8: MUNICIPAL WASTE RECYCLING RATES IN EUROPE BY COUNTRY ....................................................................................49 FIGURE 9: WASTE TREATMENT BY TYPE OF RECOVERY AND DISPOSAL IN THE EU, 2018 (% OF TOTAL TREATMENT) ............................49 FIGURE 10: EU FUND ALLOCATION TOWARDS SOLID WASTE IN THE FOUR COUNTRIES (2014-2021 PROGRAMMING PERIOD) ..............50 List of Tables TABLE 1: DEFINITIONS OF A SUSTAINABLE CITY........................................................................................................................12 TABLE 2: SELECTED SAMPLE CITIES FOR EU SUSTAINABLE CITIES PILOT ........................................................................................23 TABLE 3: MAJOR MSWM PERFORMANCE SHORTCOMINGS AND POSSIBLE AREAS OF INTERVENTION IN THE COUNTRIES OF STUDY ........53 List of Boxes BOX 1: DEFINING A SUSTAINABLE CITY ..................................................................................................................................12 BOX 2: SDG VOLUNTARY LOCAL REVIEWS ............................................................................................................................18 BOX 3: INTERNATIONAL CITY PARTNERSHIPS: ACTING FOR GREEN AND INCLUSIVE RECOVERY (ICP-AGIR) ........................................19 6 Executive Summary The Sustainable Cities agenda is well established in the EU, but some countries still lag significantly in terms of performance against sustainability indicators. Only 26% of EU cities and 40% of large cities (those of over 150,000 inhabitants) have adaptation plans based on sustainable models. A recent smart and sustainability ranking for the 28 European capital cities found that 11 of the bottom 14 cities are in Eastern Europe.1 This is in addition to performance against the SDGs, which points to significant room for improvement in sustainability performance for cities in Eastern and Southern Europe. This is a worrying situation if cities and regions are to play their essential role towards a green and sustainable COVID-19 recovery and meeting the targets of the EU Green Deal, which aims for a transition to carbon-neutrality by 2050. The Sustainable Cities Implementation Framework (Implementation Framework) and its first application in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland and Romania aim to help simplify and operationalize the sustainable cities agenda. It intends to capture a simple narrative: that city systems (basic service delivery, governance, etc.) must function well to deliver positive results for people, the economy, and the environment. These positive results should contribute over the longer term towards more resilient, just, and competitive cities. The framework (presented below in dashboard format) constitutes one dimension for enabling conditions (the system) and two dimensions relating to results areas (People & Economy and Environment). Each of the dimensions are further comprised of a series of building blocks. The choice of building blocks is strongly influenced by the strategic focus on a green recovery and resilience in the EU context, resulting in a stand-alone environmental dimension. Sustainable Cities Implementation Framework (Dashboard representation) Each of the blocks in the dashboard is underpinned by a set of quantitative and qualitative indicators which allows for a visual representation of performance against the different sub-themes covered. To select the chosen indicators, a review of 38 global indicator frameworks and monitoring tools was 1Adeoluwa Akande, Pedro Cabral, Paulo Gomes, Sven Casteleyn, (2019). “The Lisbon ranking for smart sustainable cities in Europe.� Sustainable Cities and Society, 44: 475-487. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scs.2018.10.009. 7 conducted, resulting in more than 1,900 indicators aggregated and then reviewed for commonality. This yielded 115 common and desirable quantitative indicators (both output and outcome indicators) which are regularly used in other frameworks and fit with the new Implementation Framework. However, the review of data availability for cities in the 4 countries in the study showed significant data gaps. This led to adjustments to the methodological approach, namely the increased customization of indicators by country and the introduction of qualitative inputs by questionnaire in order to make meaningful conclusions amidst data-constrained contexts. The application of the tool in selected cities in the four countries points to a disconnect between the enabling conditions (System Dimension) and outcome-oriented dimensions (People & Economy and the Environment). It signals several potential issues: i) quality issues in the existing plans and strategies that are not correctly identifying key sustainability issues and thus resources are not appropriately channeled; or ii) a lack of local government capacity and technical skills to move from plans and strategies to their implementation, such as designing and investing in quality infrastructures; or iii) bureaucratic and administrative bottlenecks constraining the pace of progression from the development of plans and strategies to actual funding of their priorities. The proximity of local governments to the electorate can also further complicate the making of difficult political decisions. In order to better understand the observed disconnect, deep dives were conducted in several sectoral areas, namely Urban Form, Solid Waste Management and Air Quality. While most sustainability frameworks focus on the what, these deep dives aim to answer the why question of the observed underperformance. The deep dives were broadly approached through considering whether there are (for each issue): i) enabling and well-functioning regulatory environments, ii) sufficient financing and funding available, and iii) other implementation bottlenecks such as institutional capacity as a function of abilities and willingness/incentives. The most pressing implementation bottleneck regards institutions and capacity, while several sector-specific recommendations are presented. In terms of urban form, the current spatial form in the countries under review has 3 main characteristics: i) hollowing out of the urban core; ii) expanding urban fringes; and iii) disjointed agglomerations. All countries that are part of this report experienced urban built-up area expansions that exceeded population growth and, in some instances, even economic growth. Existing planning tools both at national and sub-national levels of governments are not sufficiently coherent and robust to facilitate and steer urban growth and development. At the metropolitan level, there is often a lack of instruments to support inter-jurisdictional planning and investment that maximizes efficiency and effectiveness of urban services and infrastructures. There is also a disconnect between spatial and capital investment planning. Urban expansions are driven mostly by private sector investment with little public sector involvement, the public services and infrastructure provision in the expansion area often end up being insufficient, lacking mass- transit mechanism and social infrastructure that are particularly important for residents, and too costly to be met retroactively. This in turn increases residents’ need to commute and their reliance on the private car, creating the quality of life problems such as air pollution. Behind this suboptimum sequencing of decision making between planning and infrastructure investment lies the lack of total lifecycle costing practice by the local governments. Essentially, local governments are not fully appraising the financial or environmental cost of urban expansion when they develop and implement spatial policies and investment prioritization for urban development. 8 Considering Municipal Solid Waste Management (MWSM), the countries have all set ambitious targets for advancing up the ‘waste hierarchy’ by increasing the recovery and recycling of waste but actual achievement of national targets and objectives remains limited. This ensues from a weak enabling environment for subnational governments who are primarily responsible for providing on-the-ground SWM collection, sorting, and disposal services and facilitate waste reduction from sources. The countries have been allocated and utilized significant funding for capital investments from the EU in this space, but in some instances (such as Bulgaria) this has resulted in a short-term focus on capturing available funds rather than optimizing the investment prioritization and funding execution. While all four countries have applied the polluter-pays principle, most tariffs are set too low to reach cost-recovery levels and currently collected revenues for waste collection and landfilling do not cover operations and maintenance costs. Limited data collection as well as monitoring and evaluation of operational performance hamper the improvement of MSWM practice. While all four countries have transposed EU legislation covering air quality and greenhouse gas emissions, including source-specific regulations, into national legislation, compliance remains weak. Additional and country-tailored local, regional, and national policies and measures remain undeveloped for the countries to successfully supplement and support the EU policy implementation. All four countries have registered continued exceedances of the EU air quality limit and target values, and in the case of Romania, there have been systemic failures to monitor pollution across the territory and failure to produce a National Air Pollution Control Program as required by the National Emissions Reduction Commitments Directive. In addition to the technical capacity constraints, limited financial resources available to subnational governments hamper their ability to develop and implement effective policies to improve air quality. Lack of collaboration and information sharing among stakeholders – from all levels of governments to private entities – and a general lack of public acceptance and political will compound to the challenge of improving air quality. As minimum standards are not being met in some of the countries considered, a greater range of evidence points to the need for new air quality management tools that enable targeting of stakeholders’ efforts to the areas of greatest need. While there is some evidence that such tools are under development (e.g., a forthcoming small sensor network in Warsaw), greater assistance will be needed to ensure that the required pollutants’ monitoring, modelling and emissions assessment tools are available at the city scale. Several key findings and recommendations, largely focused on the enabling systems dimension of the framework, are drawn from this research and can be summarized as follows: • A shift towards greater results-based approaches (rather than the current input-driven approaches) is required in municipal financing and management systems to provide subnational governments with not only abilities but also incentives in enhancing sustainability. Examples of such an approach may include performance-based allocation of fiscal transfers, national programs and within-city decision making; • Tailored and differentiated capacity building programs for cities that go beyond technical assistance to design projects and apply for capital funds to include aspects such as developing and maintaining multi-stakeholder partnerships, devising financial and non-financial incentive schemes, etc., are necessary for the cities to enhance sustainability; • The long-term financial sustainability of cities should receive more policy attention both at the national and local level in the context of declining populations, under-performance of own-source 9 revenues as well as the overreliance on EU funds and central transfers. Achievement of national sustainability goals or climate targets are directly related to the ability of local government to deliver basic services in a financially sustainable way; • Enhancing vertical and horizontal cooperation across different tiers and jurisdictions of governments is critical to improve sustainability results. Such cooperation is particularly essential in the areas of interjurisdictional planning and investment for urban agglomerations as well as overall knowledge-sharing among municipalities; • Strengthening data collection, monitoring, and reporting at the local level can lead to better identification of priority problems, inform targeted policy planning, and encourage greater accountability and transparency regarding the implementation of proposed policies; and • Climate change adaptation and disaster resilience at local level call for urgent attention, as it was observed to be the area in which the input dimensions (e.g., plans, strategies) were lacking at the city level. Given the current pandemic and climate crisis this is an area that will require much greater city level focus. The Sustainable Cities Implementation Framework presents a rapid diagnostic and dialogue tool to simplify and operationalize the sustainable cities agenda. Applying the approach outlined in this report presents findings that allow opportunities for engagement at the individual city level, from cohering different sectoral considerations (i.e., across role players on a specific topic such as Solid Waste Management) and strengthening vertical alignment - for instance with national level with a focus on the enabling environment for city sustainability (ranging from planning to finances). Use of the dashboard can help to make the local visible to the national level and encourage cities to reflect on whether their efforts towards sustainability are in fact on track to deliver long term results. 10 Introduction The emergence of Sustainable Cities as a global theme Cities are key to unlocking a climate-smart future for all, as they account for more than 50% of the global population, about 70% of global energy-related CO2 emissions and 80% of global GDP. Urban centers’ share of emissions is expected to grow as the urban population is projected to increase by 2.3 billion people by 20502. As the world recovers from the COVID-19 crisis, cities will present a huge opportunity to rebuild in a way that is climate friendly and meets some of the world’s ambitious climate targets. Cities are viewed as the source of and the solution to many of today's economic, social, and environmental challenges. This is not only because of the concentration of population and economic assets in urban areas, but also because local authorities perform key functions that impact the quality of life of their residents. The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the New Urban Agenda recognize the role of cities in achieving sustainable development. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, adopted in 2015 as a plan of action for people, planet and prosperity, places special emphasis on cities. This is achieved through an urban-specific SDG (SDG 11) and the emphasis placed on cities in achieving all the SDGs by 2030.3 In fact, all 17 SDGs have an urban dimension: 90 out of 169 indicators directly encompass urban areas, while the OECD has identified that at least 105 out of the 169 SDG targets require the full engagement and participation of regions and cities to deliver the intended outcomes.4 The range of challenges posed by climate change, economic transformation and demographic shifts are formidable, with governments and city mayors facing increasing pressure to find sustainable solutions. Given that today’s infrastructure investments will be locked in for hundreds of years, cities should adopt sustainable development policies as soon as possible.5 UN-Habitat emphasizes the need to “strengthen urbanization as the engine for sustainable global development and to overcome the current unsustainable model of urbanization.� The New Urban Agenda (NUA), the first internationally agreed document detailing the implementation of the urban dimension of the SDGs, also marks a paradigm shift in clearly stating the opportunities embedded in sustainable urban development, identifying it as part of the solution to societal challenges: “(In SDG11 and the New Urban Agenda) [...] It is acknowledged that cities are drivers of progress and not solely a source of problems and risks, which can be seen as paradigm shift. Urban development is crucial for reaching the sustainable development goals, because more than half of the global population is living in urban areas nowadays and this number continues to grow.� (JPI UE Scientific Advisory Board). 2 UNDESA (2018) World Urbanization Prospects 2018, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs. 3 SDG11 specifically targets the building of sustainable cities and communities, making cities inclusive, safe and resilient. 4 OECD, 2019. Measuring the distance to the SDGS in regions and cities. 5World Bank, 2013. Building Sustainability in an Urbanizing World. https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/622651468320375543/pdf/801060REVISED00170Partnership0Paper.pdf 11 Despite this widespread consensus on the need to increase city sustainability, little consensus exists on the exact definition of a sustainable city, though several common themes emerge (see Box 1). Box 1: Defining a sustainable city The 1987 Brundtland Commission defined sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.� This became the recognized and widely accepted definition of the term for years following; it has guided research and served as a driver for numerous initiatives, though the definition is broad and many other definitions have been proposed since.6 As regards the urban context, the UN Sustainable City Program has defined the sustainable city as one that is able to retain the supply of natural resources while achieving economic, physical, and social progress, and remain safe against environmental risks that could undermine development. Though there is no agreed universal definition of a sustainable city, most literature include a range of environmental, economic, social, political, demographic, institutional and cultural goals. According to ICLEI Local Governments for Sustainability7 “sustainable cities work towards an environmentally, socially, and economically healthy and resilient habitat for existing populations, without compromising the ability of future generations to experience the same .’ A definition used in some World Bank publications states that Sustainable Cities are “resilient cities that are able to adapt to, mitigate, and promote economic, social and environmental change.� Table 1: Definitions of a sustainable city Definition Oxford A city constructed or landscaped in such a way as to minimize environmental Dictionary degradation, with facilities (such as transport, waste management, etc.) which are designed so as to limit their impact on the natural environment, while providing the infrastructure needed for its inhabitants.8 UNECE and A smart sustainable city is an innovative city that uses ICTs and other means to ITU: Smart improve quality of life, efficiency of urban operation and services, and competitiveness, sustainable while ensuring that it meets the needs of present and future generations with respect to cities economic, social, environmental as well as cultural aspects. 9 Sustainable Urban Development (SUD) is often used interchangeably with Sustainable Cities, but it is worth distinguishing between the terms. While Sustainable cities (or city sustainability) refers to a desired future state or a set of conditions that persist over time, Sustainable Urban Development implies a process through which sustainability is achieved.10 6 Brundtland, G. (1987). Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development: Our Common Future. United Nations General Assembly document A/42/427. 7 https://www.iclei.org/ 8 Oxford English Dictionary, Lexico. (n.d.). Sustainable City. In Lexico.com. Retrieved October 28, 2021, from https://www.lexico.com/definition/sustainable_city 9 UNECE and ITU developed jointly a definition of smart sustainable cities, through a multi-stakeholder approach which involved over 300 international experts. 10 Stephen M. Wheeler and Timothy Beatley (Eds.), The Sustainable Urban Development Reader, Third Edition (New York: Routledge, 2014). 12 From an urban management perspective, the leading resource and knowledge sharing platform is the GEF funded Global Platform for Sustainable Cities (GPSC), hosted by the World Bank.11 The GPSC states that achieving sustainability requires the balanced accomplishment of outcomes against four pillars, namely (1) robust economic growth, prosperity, and competitiveness across all parts of the city; (2) protection and conservation of ecosystems and natural resources into perpetuity; (3) mitigation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions while fostering overall city resilience; and (4) inclusiveness and livability, mainly through the reduction of city poverty levels and inequality. The Urban Sustainability Framework (USF), developed to outline the areas of work and support by the GPSC, offers a very useful representation of both outcomes as well as enabling actions and requirements (such as spatial data and good governance) cities could focus on. Figure 1: Urban Sustainability Framework - The Global Platform for Sustainable Cities Source: World Bank Urban Sustainability Framework | GPSC (thegpsc.org). European Context While the Sustainable Cities agenda is well established within the EU context, some countries still lag significantly in terms of performance against sustainability indicators . A high-level European Commission report found that only 26% of EU cities and 40% of large cities (those of over 150,000 inhabitants) have adaptation plans for the future based on sustainable models.12 A recently published 11 https://www.thegpsc.org/ and https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/urbandevelopment/brief/global-platform-for- sustainable-cities 12 Towards a sustainable Europe in 2030. European Commission. 2019 13 academic study13, conducting a smart and sustainability ranking for the 28 European capital cities found that twelve of the top performing 14 cities are in Western Europe, while 11 of the bottom 14 cities are in Eastern Europe. Sofia (Bulgaria) and Bucharest (Romania) were ranked last and scored significantly below other capital cities in this evaluation. This is in addition to the performance against the SDGs, which points to significant room for improvement in sustainability performance in Eastern and Southern Europe broadly. The EU policy environment has undergone significant evolution in support of sustainable urban development over the past 20 years. The first framework for Sustainable Urban Development (SUD) in Europe dates back to 1998, while the 2007 Leipzig Charter and the Pact of Amsterdam in 2016 represent key milestones in achieving the sustainable development of European urban areas. The EU Urban Agenda (flowing from the Pact of Amsterdam14) provides an integrated and coordinated approach to address the urban dimension of EU and national policies and legislation, offering 14 thematic partnerships which can be regarded as priority themes for urban development. Figure 2: Evolution of the Urban dimension of EU Policy Source: Author’s update of graphic from Handbook of Sustainable Urban Development Strategies. European Commission, 2019 Cities and regions are essential in implementing the targets of the EU Green Deal which aims to support the transition to carbon-neutrality by 2050. The Green Deal establishes a forward-looking framework for completing and further reinforcing the objectives set forth within the Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Developments. It offers a cross-sectoral toolbox for improving the sustainability of the Member States, covering investment, innovation, health-related aspects, decarbonization, energy efficiency and international cooperation on environmental standards. Some key features of the Green Deal include the Circular Economy Action Plan (high-level strategic document, focusing on products, key value chains and reducing waste) and a focus on multiple transformations (aligning action in key areas such as energy, environment, mobility and transport, regional policy and low- carbon economy, sustainable finance, etc.). In addition to the Green Deal, the EU has also adopted a new Climate Package, which contains the EU Strategy on Adaptation to Climate Change. The main goal of the 13 Akande, Adeoluwa, et al. "The Lisbon ranking for smart sustainable cities in Europe." Sustainable Cities and Society 44 (2019): 475-487. 14 https://ec.europa.eu/futurium/en/node/1829 14 Strategy is pursued through mitigation of heat-waves, droughts, and other climate-related hazards affecting the European Union that cannot be avoided by the current efforts for reducing climate change. In July 2021, a Mayors Summit on Local Green Deals15 took place with the aim to create a strategic blueprint to assist cities in accelerating their sustainable transition and build momentum to scale up and implement the provisions of the Green Deal at the local level. The blueprint underlines the subsequent rationale of the Local Green Deal with key principles, specific levers and concrete steppingstones for cities, local and national stakeholders, and community-level organizations. The guide offers a step-by-step approach for cities looking to implement a Local Green Deal, while providing linkages with European initiatives relevant for the implementation of the Green Deal at local level. These include: • Green Deal Going Local developed by the European Committee of the Regions; • The Mannheim Message by the Sustainable Cities Platform; • Climate Neutral and Smart Cities Mission, developed by the European Commission; and • National-level regulatory developments, such as the National Energy and Climate Plans (NECPs), and the Environmental Review under the European Semester. The EU Mission for Climate Neutral and Smart Cities16 is an additional mechanism to accelerate action at local level available for the 2021-2027 programming period. This is an approach to operate a portfolio of actions, such as research projects, policy measures or even legislative initiatives, to achieve a measurable goal that could not be achieved through individual actions. The added value of the Cities Mission is that it takes a cross-sectoral and demand-led approach, creating synergies between existing initiatives. It bases all of its activities on the actual needs of cities in reaching the Mission objectives. In the case of this mission, the aims are: 1. Deliver at least 100 climate-neutral and smart cities by 2030 2. Ensure that these cities act as experimentation and innovation hubs to enable all European cities to follow suit by 2050. The Cities Mission will have as its central feature the “Climate City Contracts� which each participating city will develop and implement. While not legally binding, these contracts will constitute a clear and highly visible political commitment not just to the Commission and the national and regional authorities, but also to their citizens. They will set out plans for the city to achieve climate neutrality by 2030 and they will include an investment plan. Climate City Contracts will be co-created with local stakeholders and citizens, with the help of a Mission Platform, which will provide the necessary technical, regulatory and financial assistance to cities. 15https://ec.europa.eu/growth/news/blueprint-cities-make-most-eu-green-deal-2021-07-02_en 16 https://ec.europa.eu/info/sites/default/files/research_and_innovation/funding/documents/ec_rtd_eu-mission-climate-neutral-cities- infokit.pdf 15 Regional stakeholders, initiatives and knowledge partners As the mandated body responsible for EU policy on regions and cities, DG REGIO is a key role player in the institutional landscape for sustainable cities. DG Regio holds a primary role in Sustainable Urban Development as the custodian of the Cohesion policy, the EU Urban Agenda, and the operational arm of the new European Urban Initiative (EUI)17. Several other DGs’ work areas are highly relevant to sustainable cities, particularly DG CLIMA and DG ENV. Likewise, the European Joint Research Center (JRC), in partnership with DG REGIO, also provides significant support through the Urban Data Platform 18 , which provides information on the status and trends of cities and regions. The new EUI is an overarching initiative which aims to facilitate and support cooperation and capacity building of urban actors, innovative actions, knowledge, policy development and communication in the area of Sustainable Urban Development. As such, it integrates many existing efforts at the EU level. The EUI has been allocated EUR 500 million from ERDF (from Investments for jobs and growth goal) to integrate the ongoing actions to support urban development among the following strands: i. capacity-building (20%), delivered through URBACT and the Urban Development Network (UDN). ii. innovative actions (60%), delivered through Urban Innovative Actions (UIA), based on various initiatives of the JRC, ESPON, Joint Programming Initiative Urban Europe, other Commission services, OECD, World Bank, International Financial Institutions, United Nations iii. knowledge, policy development and communication (20%). In particular, the EUI should be a structured mechanism to streamline and expand support to the implementation and localization of the SDGs in the EU cities. Practical knowledge, experiences and lessons learnt from the activities of strands a) and b) as well as from the implementation of cohesion policy (evaluations, good practices, impact assessments etc.) will be capitalized, shared and disseminated with national contact points, workshops, conferences and digital media. The Urban Agenda for the EU would also be supported by this strand. Further details are presented on some of the key entities outlined in the urban initiative. 17 European Commission. 2019. EXPLANATORY MEMO: EUROPEAN URBAN INITIATIVE- POST 2020. https://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/docgener/brochure/explanatory_memo_eui_post_2020_en.pdf 18 https://urban.jrc.ec.europa.eu/#/en 16 ESPON (European Observation Network for Territorial Development and Cohesion) 19 Founded in 2002, ESPON produces data on territorial trends related to various economic, social and environmental aspects, to identify sources of potential and economic challenges in regions, cities and larger territories. ESPON has several initiatives related to urban matters such as the GRETA project on green infrastructure, YUTRENDS on youth mobility in cities, and the LOCATE project which studies the possibility to implement a low-carbon economy using various examples of cities as case studies. Their research on Financial Instruments and Territorial Cohesion is also strongly connected to urban development. ESPON has also produced significant work to localize the SDGs by developing a web application for reporting indicators which can support local and regional governments (both as a local self- assessment tool and a national level guideline) to monitor the extent to which the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is translated into local actions. URBACT20 URBACT III acts as a European exchange and learning program for promoting Sustainable Urban Development. It enables European cities to work together to develop solutions to urban challenges and share good practices, lessons and answers with all stakeholders involved in urban policy throughout Europe. URBACT III is organized around four main objectives: 1. Capacity for Policy Delivery: To improve the capacity of cities to manage sustainable urban policies and practices in an integrated and participative way. 2. Policy Design: To improve the design of sustainable strategies and action plans in cities. 3. Policy Implementation: To improve the implementation of integrated and sustainable urban strategies and action plans in cities. 4. Building and Sharing Knowledge: To ensure that practitioners and decision makers at all levels have increased access to knowledge and share know-how on all aspects of sustainable urban development in order to improve urban development policies. 19 https://www.espon.eu/Urban-Development 20 https://urbact.eu/urbact-glance 17 The Joint Research Centre of the European Commission21 The JRC plays an important role in the sustainability of cities 22 . The urban dimension of JRC, under the Knowledge Centre for Territorial Policies (KC TP), is a Commission-wide initiative of knowledge services supporting functions around three strands of activities: 1. Policy implementation support tools, including STRAT-Board 23 , reuniting all the urban strategies at the European level, the Handbook of Sustainable Development Strategies 24 (2020) and The European Handbook for SDG Voluntary Local Reviews (2020)25 2. Data and tools under the Urban Data Platform Plus26 (UPD+) and the Territorial Modelling Platform (LUISA) 3. The Community of Practice on Cities (CoP-CITIES)27, including the Future of Cities report (since 2019) and the City Science Initiative)28. Moreover, the JRC implements a range of projects related to the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, such as the smart specialization platform,29 and indicator platform dubbed as KnowSDGs30, a platform for analysis and modeling of indicators, and a platform for Enabling Sustainable Development Goals31. Box 2: SDG Voluntary Local Reviews The EU encourages cities to submit SDG Voluntary Local Reviews (VLRs). In 2020, the JRC published the Handbook for SDG Voluntary Local Reviews to provide guidance to policy makers, researchers and practitioners in setting up local monitoring systems specifically targeted for European cities. This initiative is noteworthy as it provides examples of official and experimental indicators to use in monitoring progress and assess their own specific needs and challenges. As the manual states, “the production of VLRs serve a double purpose: on the one hand, it can help the city to assess its own achievement of the SDGs; on the other hand, if done in a harmonized way at European scale, it can enable the assessment of European cities’ contribution to the achievement of the 2030 Agenda at country or even continental level.� 21 https://ec.europa.eu/info/departments/joint-research-centre_en 22 https://www.eukn.eu/fileadmin/Files/Policy_Labs/2020_November_26/JRC122792_Final_P_01.pdf 23 https://urban.jrc.ec.europa.eu/strat-board/ 24 https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/publication/eur-scientific-and-technical-research-reports/handbook-sustainable-urban-development-strategies 25 https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/publication/eur-scientific-and-technical-research-reports/european-handbook-sdg-voluntary-local- reviews#:~:text=VLRs%20are%20a%20fundamental%20instrument,and%20competitive%20sustainability%20in%20particular. 26 https://urban.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ 27 https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/communities/en/community/cop-cities 28https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/communities/en/community/city-science- initiative#:~:text=The%20City%20Science%20Initiative%20provides,the%20science%20and%20policy%20interface. 29 https://s3platform.jrc.ec.europa.eu/sustainable-development-goals 30 https://knowsdgs.jrc.ec.europa.eu/ 31 https://knowsdgs.jrc.ec.europa.eu/enablingsdgs 18 Box 3: International City Partnerships: Acting for Green and Inclusive Recovery (ICP-AGIR) One of the latest initiatives in the realm of sustainable cities launched by DG REGIO is the International City Partnerships: Acting for Green and Inclusive Recovery. The project is to be implemented from October 2021 – March 2023 and originate in a pilot project of the European Parliament. The objective of this project is to contribute to the improvement of quality of life in participating cities, by promoting sustainable and integrated urban development, through the identification of innovative policies and programs. The programme's full name is rather long, but the second part of its acronym (ICP-AGIR) says it all: 'agir', French for 'to act', because action is this new programme's unwritten motto. 14 European cities were selected as participants after a call for interest issued by DG REGIO. The program focuses on four themes: circular economy, air quality, energy transition, and inclusion of migrants and refugees. The program will prepare, run and evaluate working meetings and study visits in both EU and non-EU countries. It will also set up a collaborative on-line platform to facilitate the exchange of information and good practices. In early 2022, the program kicked off with Asian and EU cities starting their collaboration to exchange knowledge within the field of circular economy, energy transitions and air quality. The official online event brought together 45 participants from Singapore, Milan, Taichung, Prato, Taoyuan, Braga, Incheon, Berlin, Gwangju and Athens, as well as several EU Delegations and representatives of DG REGIO. Next steps include cooperation with South African cities in the realm of integrating circular economy and nature-based solutions. EU and Canadian cities will focus on their common challenge of inclusion of migrants and refugees. For more information visit: https://icp-agir.eu/ In addition to the partners and programs directly affiliated with or funded through the EC, two further entities can be highlighted: Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR)32 Founded in 1951, CEMR serves as the association of local and regional governments from 41 European countries at all territorial levels – local, intermediate and regional. It spans 60 national associations of towns and 100,000 local governments. CEMR’s work centers on influencing European policy and legislation in areas having an impact on municipalities and regions and providing a forum for debate between local and regional governments. CEMR has associations with initiatives around mobility, climate and energy transition, waste management and circular economy, and digitalization of local and regional public services. 32 https://www.ccre.org/ 19 EU Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy33 The EU Covenant of Mayors (CoM) was launched in 2008 as a voluntary agreement to gather and mobilize local leaders towards achieving EU climate and energy targets. It currently has 9,790 city signatories representing 223,460,350 inhabitants across the EU-27. Authorities signing up for the CoM commit to developing and implementing actions at local level to contribute to the climate challenge and the sustainability of their territories. The shared vision of the signatories for 2050 is to accelerate decarbonization in their territories and strengthen capacity to adapt to climate change. This commitment is translated into concrete measures and projects by the implementation of the Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plan (SECAP), which includes the strategies and key actions local authorities intend to undertake. The scientific and technological support for this initiative has been largely undertaken by the JRC. Another relevant resource for the signatories is the Urban Adaptation Support Tool (UAST) developed by the European Climate Adaptation Platform (Climate-ADAPT). The UAST is the main resource for climate adaptation practices for the Covenant community and helps the signatories to achieve their commitment of increasing resilience to climate change. 33 https://www.covenantofmayors.eu/en/ 20 3 themes, 12 building blocks: An organizing framework for Sustainable Cities Implementation A simplified dashboard Given the broad and complex range of issues to consider when discussing Sustainable Cities, the challenge is to simplify and operationalize the agenda in order to better support city level action. As mentioned in the introduction, the Urban Sustainability Framework (USF) 34 is the one of the most comprehensive frameworks for cities to apply. It adopts an integrated approach broadly grouped into enabling and outcome dimensions. Taking the USF as a starting point, a simplified framework has been developed along three dimensions (Urban Systems, People & Economy, and Environment) and 12 constituent blocks (see Figure 3 below).35 The Urban System blocks broadly corresponds with the USF’s “enabling conditions� while People & Economy and the Environment blocks relate to the USF’s “outcome conditions.� Figure 3: Sustainable Cities Implementation Framework (Dashboard representation) The framework above aims to capture a simple narrative: that city systems (infrastructure, governance, institutions, etc.) have to function well in order to deliver positive results for people, the economy and the environment. These positive results should contribute over the longer term towards more resilient, just and competitive cities. Given the strong focus on a green recovery and resilience in the EU context, a stand-alone environmental dimension was included, allowing for four focused building blocks along this theme. This results in only four building blocks to cover the entire people and economy dimension, admittedly a very large “bucket� of aggregated issues. This is not to diminish the importance of this dimension, but rather to reflect the critical importance of cities in taking positive climate action as a matter of urgency in line with the EU Green Deal and SDG targets. Positive actions and investments in the 34For full details and document to download: https://www.thegpsc.org/usf. 35 More information available in supporting World Bank Publications such as Sustainable Cities Implementation Framework data and methodology report. 21 environment and climate space must also be approached in a way to support effective and more sustainable results for people and the economy. Each of the blocks in the dashboard is underpinned by a set of quantitative and qualitative indicators which allows for a visual representation of performance against the different dimensions. Sustainable development indicators are increasingly used by public administration in order to articulate cities' goals and inform sustainable development strategies by enabling assessment and monitoring activities. 36 In order to select the chosen indicators, a review of 38 global indicator frameworks and monitoring tools was conducted, resulting in excess of 1900 indicators aggregated and then reviewed for commonality. This yielded 115 common and desirable quantitative indicators (both output and outcome indicators) which are regularly used in other frameworks and would be employed in the new Implementation Framework (see : Sustainable Cities Quantitative Indicator). Particular attention was paid to ensure that the selected indicators selected were also used in top frameworks and tools such as the OECD’s measuring the distance to the SDGs in Regions and Cities, ESPON’s SDG Localizing Tool, and the NUA Monitoring Framework. A review of data availability against quantitative indicators for cities in the 4 countries in the study showed significant data gaps. In order to make meaningful conclusions, several methodological adjustments were made to the approach, namely the increased customization of indicators to accommodate data availability at local level for each country and the introduction of qualitative inputs into the assessment. The need to report on progress with qualitative and quantitative data is highlighted in the New Urban Agenda, as the incorporation of qualitative data can help deliver more meaningful results and insights into the state of sustainability in cities.37 In this framework the inclusion of qualitative elements is achieved through the development of a questionnaire, informed by, amongst other best practice cases, the GFDRR’s CityStrength Diagnostic 38 . The qualitative component of the dashboard provides a deeper understanding of the planning structures and competences of local governments and can mostly be considered input indicators. The sample questionnaire for qualitative inputs is attached in Annex 2: Qualitative Component of the Sustainable Cities Framework. 36 Ahvenniemi, Hannele, et al. "What are the differences between sustainable and smart cities?." Cities 60 (2017): 234-245. 37 https://www.urbanagendaplatform.org/reporting-guidelines 38 The CityStrength Diagnostic: Promoting Urban Resilience (worldbank.org) 22 First application of the Framework: City data dashboards The dashboard tool was applied as a test case in several selected cities in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland and Romania (Table 2). The cities were selected based on their demographic characteristics, geography, economic activities, sustainability ambitions and data availability. Given the lack of city level data (as discussed), the spatial unit of analysis for some indicators had to be shifted from city-level to the province, macro-region or aggregated country level figures. While the ESPON Localizing the SDGs tool helped increase the data availability at NUTS 2 level, further availability of data from national statistics proved highly variable by country: this led to the adjustment and adaptation of indicators employed where necessary. If several indicators proved suitable, the preference went to an indicator more commonly used in most recognized monitoring and assessment frameworks, particularly those presented in the section on assessment frameworks39. Table 2: Selected sample cities for EU Sustainable Cities pilot Bulgaria Croatia Poland Romania 1 Sofia Zagreb Warsaw Bucharest 2 Burgas Split Katowice Constanța 3 Plovdiv Poznań Sibiu 4 Varna Sample results for single city: Warsaw, Poland This dashboard for Warsaw was completed through a desktop exercise for quantitative data while the qualitative questionnaire was filled by a senior city counterpart. The visual representation summarizes performance in a single dashboard with supplementary sections displaying data and qualitative responses for each block of the framework. The overall dashboard presents the performance of the city in each dimension according to simple performance measures of “Low�, “Fair�, or “Excellent�. These findings help quickly identify the areas in which cities face sustainability challenges. In some of the more detailed panels on specific building blocks, neutral or informative indicators are those displayed in blue. Such indicators do not have a material bearing on the results due to their subjectivity (e.g., “Satisfaction with green spaces�) where more performance-based indicators may be preferred (e.g., the area of green space available within a 15-minute walk), or their disconnect from performance outcomes. However, they may provide useful background information. 39 The SDG Voluntary Local Review can provide a helpful resource in this regard. 23 Figure 4: Sample result of EU Sustainable Cities dashboard – Warsaw, Poland Warsaw presents fair overall performance in terms of the enabling environment and outcomes related to sustainability. Yet the findings across all blocks tend to be qualified by their reliance on qualitative performance, as data availability was limited to just 35 quantitative indicators out of over 100 indicators outlined for the assessment. Further, there is some evidence of a disconnect between the presence of systems in place and actual performance outcomes. Building blocks in Urban Systems Dimension 24 25 26 The city has a strong performance in the components which constitute the System dimension. Basic services coverage is universal and accessible, with high coverage to water supply networks, central heating and solid waste collection services and performance management systems in place, and equitability and financial accessibility of basic services. The Well-planned block indicates more limited performance particularly in transport and land use. While strategies and regular data collection are in place, in practice capital investments planning and inter-jurisdictional governance beyond the city’s immediate administrative boundaries are limited. Warsaw registers moderate performance in the Financially sound block, owing to its multi-year capital investment planning and capacity to perform financial management using relevant digital tools. However, the city is not collecting own source revenues fully, and does not have an operating surplus. Some weaknesses in performance are induced from the central level in that while fiscal transfers are stable and transparent, and the allocation formula encourages greater revenue collection, fiscal transfers are not sufficient to fund delegated functions by the central government and do not equalize across cities. In the Smart & Participatory block, strong performance is driven entirely by the qualitative component of the assessment, especially in relation to participation in its planning and budgeting processes; however, findings are significantly qualified in relation to its broader outcomes and indicators in e-governance. Building blocks in the People & Economy Dimension 27 28 Based on the findings of the assessment, Warsaw presents variable performance in the blocks directly relating to People and the Economy. Of this group, Warsaw presents the strongest results in Affordable and safe shelter, yet these results are strongly qualified due to lack of quantitative data. In Livability, Warsaw registers low performance in indicators on air quality, cleanliness, education, noise pollution, public spaces and health, and strong performance in access to cultural facilities and safety. Warsaw’s Livability registers stronger performance on the qualitative component due to monitoring and planning systems in place. In the Job-Friendly block, the city benefits from an infrastructure system that promotes economic growth, general ease in doing business, and links between vocational training and local industry. However, the employment rate is fairly low and innovation is behind EU averages. Meanwhile, performance in Access & Inclusion is particularly lagging, with no quantitative indicators found concerning aging and youth, disabilities, ethnic minorities, gender, inequality, LGBT. Further, the urban planning system does not adequately encourage the design of inclusive urban space that accommodates youth, aging, and disabilities, and it has only moderate capacity to adjust and or increase the provision of basic services in line with rapid changes in the population. 29 Building blocks in the Environment dimension 30 31 Warsaw has overall moderate performance in the blocks which constitute the Environment dimension. Decarbonization is currently assessed as relatively weaker than the other blocks although it is acknowledged that the topic is receiving attention in the Green Warsaw Vision (under preparation at time of assessment). The city’s energy mix, particularly for electricity, is heavily reliant on coal and exposure to PM2.5 - which causes local warming - is high. Circularity performance is moderate, supported by strong systems in place for meeting waste collection demand, supporting separation at source, promoting waste reduction, and monitoring the performance of recycling. However, there are no incentives for diversion and/ or productive use of waste and data on separate collection is limited. The city has excellent performance in Biodiversity & Greening, owing to its large availability and accessibility of green space and active consideration for environment considerations in planning and infrastructure. Warsaw also performs well in Disaster Resilience owing to an established climate resilience/adaptation plan, city-level risk assessment, preventative maintenance and early warning mechanisms, proactive investments to reduce risks, and sufficient capacity to provide finance for relief and construction. Sample results for multiple cities in one country: Bulgaria Given the constraints and customized data approach taken, this tool is not recommended for making comparisons between cities in different countries; however, it can be useful to explore the sustainability agenda across multiple cities within a single country, provided that the indicators and target values used are consistent. As example, dashboards were populated for Sofia and the next three largest cities, namely Plovdiv, Varna and Burgas. These dashboards were completed without direct city interaction and the qualitative components were provided by in-country specialists. As this was a pilot application, expert teams completed qualitative inputs broadly for this batch of secondary cities and not for each city individually. This clearly influences the similarity in results, especially considering the low availability of quantitative data; however, in the complete dashboards, variations can nevertheless be observed among quantitative indicators. Most often though, these differences are not large enough to drive a change in the results of the blocks in the dashboard because the differences in values might not necessarily lead to performance falling at different levels (i.e., above vs. below the threshold/target values). As example, the access and inclusion block of Burgas and Plovdiv is highlighted in Figure 6. Burgas has a slightly lower age dependency ratio which falls below the threshold value, lower inequality, and significantly higher female participation in the labor force. These differences, while telling, do not result in a change in performance in the overall block. The dashboard results for Sofia seem to indicate relatively strong overall performance in the building blocks that constitute the Systems dimension. However, this result is largely qualified due to the reliance on a qualitative stock take in these dimensions which mainly considers whether systems are in place or not. It should particularly be noted that this qualitative review does not measure the quality of the systems and processes in place. While the systems comprising the enabling conditions for a sustainable city tend to be largely in place, as indicated by the presence of strategies, laws, and processes, (e.g., a strategy to encourage sustainability, a process to prioritize capital investments, etc.), there is a clear disconnect between the enabling conditions and outcome-oriented dimensions (People & Economy and the Environment). This signals weakness in the implementation of such strategies and processes, which tend to be captured and measured by the outcome-oriented dimensions. 32 The three smaller cities perform lowest in the job friendly and smart and participatory blocks but perform better than the capital city on livability. In terms of livability, this is a block with particularly low quantitative data availability and these results are impacted by public perception data (e.g., on public safety, etc.), which is particularly low in Sofia. The smart and participatory block is heavily influenced by household level internet access, and on the qualitative side by the local authority’s use of participatory processes. Of particular concern is the poor performance across the board in the Disaster Resilience block even after taking into account input indicators. This signals that even city level planning inputs are not appropriately in place. 33 Figure 5: Sample result of EU Sustainable Cities dashboard – 4 cities in Bulgaria 34 Figure 6: Comparing one building block (Access and Inclusion) between Burgas and Plovdiv 35 Results and observations from dashboard application It should be emphasized again that the dashboard approach presented here is designed to simplify the sustainable cities agenda, allow for rapid application using available data sources and ultimately to act as basis for dialogue with a city. The dashboard approach serves to visualize a broad collection of indicators, however, the mixing of output, outcome and input indicators as well as the subsequent shortage of quantitative data in specific areas (particularly the systems dimension) impacts on the ultimate presentation of city level performance. The analysis showed that the systems comprising the enabling conditions for sustainable cities are largely in place, but this does not seem to translate to results in outcome dimensions. There is a general presence of strategies, laws, and processes (e.g., a strategy to encourage sustainability, a process to prioritize capital investments, etc.), which serves as evidence of application of good practice and signals that important sustainability issues are receiving city level attention. However, this is not yet translating to significant positive results in the outcome-oriented dimensions (People & Economy and the Environment). When reviewing all the dashboards produced for the 12 selected cities, this emerges a relatively consistent pattern. This trend signals several potential issues, such as : i) quality issues in the existing plans and strategies that are not correctly identifying key sustainability issues and thus resources are not appropriately channeled; or ii) a lack of local government capacity and technical skills to move from plans and strategies to their implementation, such as designing and investing in quality infrastructures; or iii) bureaucratic and administrative bottlenecks constraining the pace of progression from the development of plans and strategies to actual funding of their priorities. Just as telling as low performance, and perhaps of even more concern, is the lack of quantitative data in and across dimensions. Many cities had quantitative data readily available for only one third of the quantitative indicators selected for the assessment. It is observed broadly across cities that data is seldom shared among agencies and data collection and analysis is not an institutional priority or core value. However, some cities intend to make progress. For Sofia specifically, the OECD notes that the city does not currently use data to align its budget process with its strategic priorities. 40 The city also reports having limited compatibility of data across policy areas. While Sofia shares some city data on the national platform for open data, the city, like many other global cities, plans to create a municipal platform for open data and to increase the number of datasets that are publicly available. One key area of concern is that of Disaster resilience, where dashboards highlighted that most cities do not even perform against the basic input indicators (i.e. no plans or strategies in place). Given the COVID-19 pandemic response and the devastating impacts of multiple disasters at the same time (i.e. flooding across Europe, wildfires in Greece, earthquakes in Croatia, etc.), this is an area that should be highlighted for action. There is an urgent need to mainstream prevention and preparedness into urban and local development planning and practice. 40 https://cities-innovation-oecd.com/assets/sofia.pdf 36 Country level observations To complement city level dashboards, it is necessary to understand the national enabling environment for city level action in each of the dimensions. Each of the four countries were assessed utilizing the 3 dimensions and 12 building blocks as a guiding framework. A summary of the findings for each country is included in Annex 4. This section provides a high-level overview of the general issues and trends observed in cities across the four countries, structured along the three dimensions in the framework. The four countries broadly share three intertwined challenges with respect to sustainable cities: i) declining populations in most medium and smaller sized cities; ii) increased urbanization and growth pressures in and around a few larger cities; and iii) and an aging population. Declining population and aging stresses the ability of cities to maintain public services amidst a shrinking tax base and loss of labor force. Sprawling new growth increases the cost of service delivery and in most instances has been accompanied by a growing dependency on car based mobility and traffic congestion. Urban System Deep dive: Municipal Solid Waste (next chapter) Deep dive: Urban Form (next chapter) Spatial patterns of growth and decline are largely similar across the four countries with suburbanization and construction on greenfield sites around the larger or growing cities and a simultaneous hollowing out of the urban center, where properties are left vacant and in disrepair. This causes a strain for municipalities to provide services and results in issues such as traffic congestion which ultimately increases the carbon footprint. There is further commonality in that national spatial perspectives and territorial development plans exist, with a relatively hierarchical structure of plans at regional and local level. City level spatial plans, however, tend to be outdated, not enforced, nor regularly amended, and further impacted by poor land management infrastructure (with the exception of Poland) such as basic GIS systems and complete cadasters and property registers. Fiscal management and capital planning at city level generally exhibit a reliance on national fiscal transfers and EU funds and some disconnect of projects from actual local needs and results. Although there is a high level of decentralization in terms of roles and responsibilities, cities in this region are heavily reliant on national fiscal transfers which often prove to be unstable (as is the case for Bulgaria, Croatia 37 and Romania) or ineffective in creating fairness and efficiency at the local level (as is the case for Poland). Various European Commission programs provide the bulk of capital investment funds, and in some countries, investment gaps are noted in those specific areas that European funds do not cover (for example, local roads in Romania). While European programs have instilled improved strategic planning process and focused attention on key development challenges, there is a tendency for cities to plan projects based on available funds rather than actual local needs. The well-established systems of project finance reward inputs (plans and project preparation) rather than results and outcomes. However, the recent Recovery and Resilience Fund to support Covid-19 recovery is designed as a Results-Based program and it should be interesting to see how current practice would have to adapt to meet targets for disbursements at national level. Local capacity constraints are highlighted through various sectoral studies as a key issue and as a main contributor to low absorption rates of EU funds (even in context of the over reliance on these funds in the municipal finance system). Even for Poland, which has a relatively good overall rate of EU fund absorption, disparities persist between regions, as wealthier regions from the western part of the country tend to absorb more funds than the poorer regions in the east. These variations are strongly driven by a lack of administrative capacity in poorer regions, despite the significant increases realized over the years. Though several countries have undertaken administrative reforms and regionalization measures to address this, the complicated administrative landscape and bureaucracy related to the management of funds remain a challenge. While the low administrative capacity is evident in the absorption of funds, this also has implications for actual implementation of solutions that support sustainability. Improvements in how basic services are delivered at local level offer opportunities to significantly enhance longer-term sustainability outcomes. As example, most cities have virtually universal waste collection services with alarmingly low recycling rates, or excellent access to potable drinking water but massive water losses due to aging infrastructure. District Heating systems are generally not well functioning, requiring large capital investment and registering significant disconnection rates over time. Transport also remains a primary contributor to emissions amidst sprawl and lack of public transport alternatives, as suburbanization in the form of greenfield development on land further away from the city promotes sprawl rather than compact development and urban regeneration. This leads to increased automobile transport and carbon emissions. In peri-urban areas, new development designed without integrated transport and urban planning has also led to traffic congestion contributing further to air pollution. The application of new technologies, a focus on improving operating efficiencies and ultimately the financial sustainability of services could support positive environment results as well. Environment While the countries have generally reduced greenhouse gas emissions, significant further action is required to meet decarbonization targets, and cities will be crucial in achieving these targets. At national 38 level, significant decarbonization and climate change related commitments have been made and captured in various strategies and plans, but their targets are not cascaded downwards to regional or city level. One example is in the realm of Solid Waste Management, where recycling targets at national level have generally not been translated into targets to which the city level can be held accountable for, even though most large cities have the legally required plans in place. Large cities (except for Poland) and new peri-urban neighborhoods tend to be characterized by limited amounts of public green spaces, which are important for environmental sustainability and livability. In Bulgarian cities, there is generally a lack of maintenance of parks and gardens which reduces the number of quality public green spaces. Bulgaria’s urban dwellers ranked their satisfaction with access to recreational and green areas with less than 6 on a 10-point scale and in only Greece the rating was lower41.Well-designed public and green spaces can have a multitude of benefits, such as improved air quality, providing microclimate regulation, and enhancing safety, social integration, and public health. This issue of green space is closely related to Urban Heat Impacts and of particular importance with extreme heat events among the deadliest hazards in Europe. Peri-urban and uncontrolled urban development tends to be characterized by poor attention to existing buildings and spaces, forest clearing, and radical changes in the traditional community structure (e.g., eliminating spaces between buildings, demolishing existing buildings, and changing land use). All of these elements are major drivers for temperature increases in built up areas. Cities in this region are highly vulnerable to several risks, including earthquakes, flooding and as mentioned, increasingly heat waves. While actions have been taken at national level, progress towards comprehensive disaster preparedness and response systems at city level has been slow. To prepare for potential disasters, cities need to build disaster risk management capacity, including capacity development for local civil protection plans, investment planning, and for strengthening resilience of critical buildings and infrastructure assets42. Building and infrastructure codes should be strengthened by embedding resilience into new and existing construction of buildings and critical infrastructure. These high levels of vulnerability should be of even greater concern given that the dashboard analysis points to Disaster Resilience as an area of poor performance almost across the board. The housing sector offers considerable potential for improving living conditions, addressing inequality, and contributing towards decarbonization through links with energy efficiency retrofitting of older building stock. Cities in Bulgaria and Romania face an aging building stock, and with the majority of the population in these countries living in multi-family apartment blocks, both countries have large national retrofit programs currently under implementation largely through EU funding. To ensure sustainability of such efforts, a focus should be placed to better strengthen and facilitate participation of homeowner associations as well as partnerships with the private sector. In Poland retrofit and heating system upgrades are directly linked to the potential for longer term air quality improvements. 41 Eurostat. 2016. “Archive: Urban Europe - statistics on cities, towns and suburbs - green cities.� Accessed October 2021 at: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Archive:Urban_Europe_-_statistics_on_cities,_towns_and_suburbs_- _green_cities&oldid=298091. 42 World Bank. 2019. “National Development Strategy Croatia 2030 Policy Note: Environment,� July 2019. 39 Transitioning economies towards greater circularity is a relatively new focus in all the countries and its progress requires policymaking, incentives and tools to enable local governments as the main change agents. Recycling forms a key part of any circularity ambitions, particularly in the realm of Solid Waste Management, and the countries under consideration are lagging significantly behind EU averages and targets in this regard. Significant investments have been made across the countries to improve solid waste management, including adoption of more regional approaches and construction of sanitary landfills. Actual service delivery of SWM is largely devolved to local or regional governments in terms of implementation. Investment and regulatory reforms notwithstanding, Bulgaria, Croatia and Romania are currently risking infringement procedures due to non-compliance with waste related EU directives. People and the Economy Deep dive: Air Quality (next chapter) Large urban agglomerations have been the drivers of growth in all the countries in the study, with large functional urban areas around the capital cities playing a significant role in this regard. Smaller and mid- sized towns and cities however are experiencing economic decline and shrinkage. There are many factors contributing to this decline such as economic decline in mono-industrial towns and limited access to higher education facilities. Therefore, there is poor labor force and difficulty to attract and retain economic activities, which prompts further outmigration to stronger economic centers. In the face of changing demographics, cities would have to adapt their service delivery to their increasingly aging and shrinking populations. A proactive local approach to active aging, which includes a strong focus on inclusion and social connections, could help create more cohesive communities and allow elderly citizens to age in place more comfortably. As regards livability, a key resource is the regular EU quality of life survey, in which Bulgaria ranks last in terms of citizen’s satisfaction. In Poland, around 80% of those surveyed in the urban areas felt a general satisfaction with living in their city, with a slightly higher share of satisfaction of those living in the largest cities. As expected, all countries show healthcare, education and childcare access and outcomes as generally better in urban than rural areas, while challenges do remain. A key component included in the livability dimension of this framework is air quality, with some of the countries in this study considered some of the most polluted in Europe. With significant negative health impacts, this requires urgent attention and commitments to significant shifts in energy production activities and transport modalities towards lower emission options. 83% of Bulgarian cities and 72% of 40 Polish cities regularly exceed the EU’s air quality standards.43 Increasingly, air quality is a growing concern for urban citizens, and coupled with requirements imposed by the EU, improving air quality has become a priority for local administrations. Interventions to improve air quality are hampered however by a variety of issues such as poor infrastructure available for collecting pollution data, costs imposed by adequate data collection, and by incomplete data collection. In addition, air pollution reduction interventions require multi-sectoral interventions (such as transport, land use, solid waste management) and working across jurisdictions (horizontal and vertically) and innovative financing solutions (such as extending affordable end user finance to support household change domestic heating solutions. Local authorities are not always sufficiently capacitated or authorized to meet these challenges. 43IQAir. 2018. “World's most polluted cities 2020 (PM2.5).� Accessed October 2021 at: https://www.iqair.com/world-most- polluted-cities 41 Deep Dives: Key sustainability issue for cities While the dashboard completion (quantitative and qualitative inputs) and the country level reviews provide pointers to areas of concern, there is a need to unpack the underlying drivers behind poor results. Most sustainability frameworks focus on the what (also the case with the quantitative elements in the dashboards presented), while the addition of qualitative inputs as well as the deep dive notes aim to answer the why question. The deep dives on three key areas of focus were broadly approached by considering the presence of the following aspects for each issue: i) enabling and well-functioning regulatory environment, ii) sufficient financing and funding available, and iii) other implementation bottlenecks. The deep dives are available as separate papers with a high-level overview of findings and recommendations presented below. The selected Deep Dive areas for further analysis are Urban Form, Municipal Solid Waste Management (MSWM) and Air Quality. Urban Form relates to the challenge of peri-urban growth and suburbanization in the larger cities in the region. Solid Waste Management is an area where significant capital investment has been made over many years (mainly in improved landfilling infrastructure), but several countries face EU penalties due to ongoing operation of non-compliant facilities, and recycling rates remain well below EU averages. Air Quality is an area of ongoing and growing concern for urban residents, and particularly in context of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and its relation to respiratory health. Urban Form Why urban form matters in the quest for sustainable cities Globally, cities are projected to grow significantly; it is estimated that by 2100, the built-up area will be between 2-6 times larger than it was in 2000. The design of the physical form of cities therefore presents an opportunity area to embed several multisectoral sustainability considerations, from tangibles like mobility, access to green spaces, building resilience through to intangibles such as inequality and municipal finances. Urban form is the canvas on which these multiple considerations find expression and co-existence. The central proposition is for urban development approaches that produce more compact and mixed-use cities. Sprawling cities are unhealthy: they generate more GHG emissions, are more vulnerable to climate change, offer a lower quality of life, are less productive and more expensive to operate. The urban contribution to GHG emissions is 70% globally, with land use change, infrastructure and building construction, transport being significant contributors. Land use change which results in loss of green spaces increases the urban heat island effect and makes cities more prone to urban flooding. Long commute times, especially by private cars result in congestion, productivity loss, increased road injuries and deaths and general frustration. Sprawling cities also tend to be more spatially unjust, often locating the urban poor on the edges of the city. Even when the urban poor are in the core of the city, these areas often have poorer services. Compact and mixed-use cities tend to have less disparities between income groups. For public administrations, the cost of sprawl is also significant: it is estimated the cost of providing and operating engineering and social infrastructure in low density and sprawling areas could be more than 42 three times higher than in compact areas. Livability approaches like “15-minute cities� pioneered in cities like Paris are also near impossible to achieve in sprawling low density and monofunctional cities. Subnational governments are uniquely placed to intervene in urban form to achieve sustainable city objectives. While spatial planning is often a shared competence, the bulk of the land use and construction permitting strategies, policies and decisions are and can be taken at a local level. In all the 4 countries that are subject of this report, subnational governments (from county to local) have wide powers to define strategies and set spatial planning policies. What are the dominant spatial patterns in the 4 countries currently and what contributes to these? The current spatial form has 3 main characteristics; i) hollowing out of the urban core; ii) expanding urban fringes and iii) disjointed agglomerations. A myriad of factors contributes to these trends: worth noting is a growth narrative that is premised on urban expansion. The most common misconception is that expansion is the manifestation of urbanization and that compact development policies are less conducive to economic growth. On average, all countries that are part of this report experienced urban expansions that exceeded population and, in some instances, even economic growth. Where there was population and economic growth, the increase in land consumption has been usually located on the fringes of economically dynamic cities. So, the challenge is not only the extent of horizontal expansion, but the location of that expansion. Existing planning tools both at national and sub-national levels of governance are not sufficiently coherent and robust to facilitate and steer urban development. At the national level, the urban strategic agenda is not always well defined. All 4 countries have national spatial frameworks/ plans but only Poland has an urban policy, while Romania is in the process of drafting one. This policy void often leads to the development of incoherent national sectoral strategies (especially transport and environment), inconsistent incentives (such as fiscal transfers based on the percent of municipal areas set aside for urban development). This inability to galvanize “all of government� towards a clear urban agenda manifests in unintended consequences at a local level. At the metropolitan level, there is often a lack of instruments to support inter-jurisdictional planning and investment. This results in incompatible development strategies, where the dynamic city may be attempting to contain growth, yet the adjoining peri-urban area is permitting land use development – examples abound, as is the case in Bucharest and Ilfov in Romania. At a local level, planning instruments are often too rigid and were conceptualized at a time when the state was the main developer. Attempts to respond to the changed environment have often swung in the opposite direction, where private development interests are largely unchecked. For instance, in Bulgaria and Romania, developers can produce low level plans (detailed spatial plans in Bulgaria and Zonal Urban Plans and Detailed Urban Plans in Romania) with very little oversight from public authorities. Data and land information management systems to enable informed decision-making are often incomplete, resulting in land use and construction permits being granted without a full view of their cumulative impact on the built form of the city. 43 Figure 7: Example of urban expansion over time and into peri-urban areas - Bucharest Source: World Bank Deep Dive on Urban Form supporting this report, utilizing Copernicus Land Monitoring Service, Urban Atlas 2006-2018 and FUA definition from Romanian Urban Policy. The existing planning instruments are predominantly regulatory in nature and are not geared to guide private sector development and tie these into broader sustainability outcomes. Very few cities have well established financial and non-financial incentives that are aligned to spatial development strategies. For instance, despite degeneration of city cores, building reconversion processes remain complex and this acts as a disincentive to private developers. Access to affordable housing is characterized by similar challenges in this regard. Most cities in the 4 countries are challenged by both chronic lack of affordable housing and high vacancy rates, with no strategies and plans to intervene to close this gap by using existing vacant stock to meet affordable housing demand. There is generally poor alignment between spatial planning and capital investment planning. This results in most capital investment lagging private sector development, resulting in the urban expansion areas being under resourced with social infrastructure and mass transit. This in turn increases the need to commute and reliance on the private car. This disconnect between planning decisions and infrastructure investment implications is exacerbated by the lack of total lifecycle costing while making land use and investment decisions. Essentially, local governments are not fully appraising the cost of urban expansion. 44 What can be done about it? 1. Policy and legislation: • Revisit the planning system across all spatial levels. At the national level, this includes the development of national urban policies which adopt a whole-of-government approach, and rationalization of national sectoral strategies and funds which may detract from principles of sustainability. Some of the existing spatial legislation needs to be refined to be more framework legislation, to ease the regulation on production of planning documents and give greater autonomy to local authorities – especially well-capacitated ones. At the metropolitan level, inter-jurisdictional collaboration should be encouraged through improved support and incentives. This could be in the form of specific investments that solve inter-jurisdictional challenges in the 2021-2027 programing period. At a local level, multi-scalar planning systems should be adopted for the city, neighborhood and plot scales with the following considerations: • City-wide plans: these should be long term (20-25 years), define vision, principles, priority areas, key investment and development areas and set clear built environment targets and tools to achieve these. These should be driven by the public authority collaboratively with key stakeholders such as real estate developers. • Neighborhood level: these plans should be based on more granular detail, transposing principles into more concrete guidelines, can have a shorter lifespan (5-7 years) and be easier to amend, especially in high growth areas. They should detail aspects such as development controls, design language, land use mix, street grid and demonstrate alignment to city-wide principles and contribution to built-environment performance targets. These should ideally be developed by public authorities, but where public resources are constrained, they may be driven by private sector but public authorities to have watching brief with clear approval stage gates. • Plot (may be more than 1 plot) level: these plans should have detailed controls such as building heights, setbacks, site coverage, entrance, and egress as well as urban design treatment of the public vs. private realm interface. These may be compiled by private sector/ property owners provided principles such as transparency are observed. Their compliance with development principles in higher order plans is critical. • Refine punitive measures to act against illegal land and construction instruments. • Focus on and prioritize urban regeneration. The importance of the urban cores in achieving sustainable cities cannot be undermined. Urban cores should be prioritized in strategic documents and resource allocation, with consideration for financial and institutional aspects, such as area regeneration units or agencies. In addition, regeneration strategies should be supported by a suite of financial and non-financial incentives targeting complex regeneration needs such as refurbishment of multi-family apartments, provision of well-located affordable housing, reconversion of disused industrial or heritage buildings and public open spaces such as parks, theatres, pedestrian boulevards, etc. 45 2. Institutions and capacity • Improve access to and use of data. This includes increasing digitization of cadaster and increasing the attributes and market intelligence that local authorities have access to. For example, cities should have visibility of vacancy rates when considering planning policies and making land use decisions. • Enhance urban development tools. These include growth containment measures, transfer of development rights, development impact fees, financial (tax rebates, upfront infrastructure investment) and non-financial incentives such as streamlined approval processes, city improvement districts, etc. The development of these instruments should be in consultation with a wide range of stakeholders to ensure their robustness and their deployment should be aligned to adopted strategies. • Introduce monitoring and evaluation systems that track performance of the built environment and can be used to make real-time land use decisions. The development or urban development tools should be linked to adopted performance targets: for instance, if the target is to increase land use mix, there ought to be instruments and tools to facilitate that. • Adopt total lifecycle costing and improve the link between spatial planning and capital investment planning. These functions often reside in different departments with little collaboration. Improving the institutional integration between these will reduce current investment deficits and ensure more targeted investment planning in the future. • Strengthen partnerships with real estate developers, professionals and investors . There is a need for a more collaborative relationship between public authorities and developers. Partnerships between these actors should drive the development agenda, recognizing that the developer landscape tends to be very complex. An expansive meaning of the term ‘Developer’ needs to be adopted, recognizing for instance that homeowners’ associations (HOAs) are also developers and local authorities need to partner with them to enable regeneration of multifamily apartments. 3. Financial • Improve Own Source Revenues (OSR). Property taxes as a share of own revenues are significantly less than EU averages. In Romania, they are 3 times lower, yet this revenue source is directly linked to planning and investment decisions by local authorities. There are some “low hanging fruits� such as improving data used to determine and collect property taxes, development of robust property tax policies that link to valuations – especially in dynamic economies while also providing rebates to support poor and vulnerable. A dynamic property tax regime can also be used to encourage investments that are consistent with city plans and retard or disincentivize undesirable investment. National government can support this through a performance grant to local governments to incentivize increasing OSR through improved efficiency without necessarily increasing the tax burden. • Close gaps in housing affordability through coordinated strategic and fiscal instruments. Inclusive multi-family buildings could for instance benefit from additional subsidies for building upgrades. Local governments can also facilitate letting of vacant private buildings as social housing and offer financial incentives to landlords. 46 • Take an integrated approach to regeneration. For example, investments in energy efficiency should also address water demand reduction measures, structural integrity (especially in areas of seismic vulnerability) and support the establishment of and functioning HOAs. Post disaster reconstruction measures should also be all-encompassing, integrating various funding sources. • Reconfigure fiscal transfer conditions which have unintended consequences at sub-national level. These include subsidies and transfers based on length of road (Bulgaria) and developable area (intravilan in Romania). Municipal Solid Waste Management Why Municipal Solid Waste Management (MSWM) matters for Sustainable Cities By 2050, in a business-as-usual scenario, the world is projected to generate 73% more municipal solid waste than in 2020.44 This trend is driven largely by increased economic development, urbanization and population growth, which drives up consumption patterns and the volume of waste. 45 Deficiencies in waste management services and infrastructure have large environmental impacts and pose direct risks for human health. For example, waste burning is a significant source of air pollution, and open dumping can lead to soil contamination and the pollution of rivers, lakes, underground water, and human living environments. Waste that is not properly managed can block drainage systems, creating risks for flooding and breeding grounds for disease. Not to mention the risks associated with landslides and fires at landfills and larger dump sites. The consequences of poor waste management can also negatively affect tourism, local economic development, and poverty reduction.46 While the national level usually sets the governing framework, strategies and targets for managing waste, the implementation of on-the-ground waste management services typically falls to the local government level. Locally generated waste, or Municipal Solid Waste (MSW), refers to what is commonly called household or household-like “trash� or “garbage.� The composition of MSW typically includes durable goods (e.g. furniture, mattresses), non-durable goods (e.g. paper, plastic plates/cups), containers and packaging (e.g. milk cartons, plastic wrap), and other wastes (e.g. yard waste, food). MSW also includes office and retail waste, but excludes industrial, hazardous, and construction wastes.47 A key component of achieving the EU Green Deal is ensuring that MSWM in the EU moves up the ‘waste hierarchy’ with municipalities increasingly following the principles of the circular economy to prevent and reduce the negative effects of using primary resources on the environment and society.48 The most widely adopted principle for improving MSWM is the ‘waste hierarchy’, which offers a guiding framework for the development and long-term planning of the waste management sector. Waste disposal in a landfill is the least desirable option on the ‘waste hierarchy’, while recycling and re-using waste and eventually preventing waste altogether are the most preferred measures. Recycling is one of the main ways to reduce the consumption of primary resources, by replacing them with secondary materials made from recycled 44 Bridging the Gap, pg. xiii 45 Bridging the Gap in Solid Waste Management: Governance Requirements for Results, pg. xiii 46 Bridging the Gap, pg. 2 47 https://css.umich.edu/factsheets/municipal-solid-waste-factsheet 48 https://www.eea.europa.eu/ims/waste-recycling-in-europe 47 waste. This is the desired approach to achieving sustainability, material self-sufficiency and the other benefits of a circular economy.49 The ultimate aspiration is for municipalities to transition the waste sector towards resource efficiency, which yields better human and environmental health outcomes. The EU Waste Policy provides a framework for Member States to manage waste in an environmentally sound manner and make better use of the secondary material it contains. 50 It sets forth several objectives to help Member States transition towards a circular economy: a) improve waste management, b) stimulate innovation in recycling, and c) limit landfilling. 51 To measure progress against these objectives, EU legislation includes more than 30 binding targets for Member States between 2015-2030. EU member states have at national level set ambitious targets for advancing up the ‘waste hierarchy’ by increasing the recovery and recycling of waste; actual performance and achievement of national targets and objectives remains limited.52 This largely comes down to a weak enabling environment for municipalities, cities or local authorities who have the primary responsibility for providing on-the-ground services and for ensuring the controlled management of solid waste. 53 For municipalities to be empowered to deliver on ambitious waste management targets, a few key elements need to be in place: an institutional framework that clearly defines roles and responsibilities; strong technical and operational MSWM capacities; good engagement with sector stakeholders so that they understand their role in the system; and the ability to design and deliver affordable and financially sustainable waste management services. What are the trends in the 4 countries currently, and what contributes to these? The 4 countries under consideration have each made significant progress towards mainstreaming the collection of waste and improving their rates of municipal recycling. Figure 8 highlights the progress EU Member States have made towards increasing their recycling rates since 2004 up until 2019, with the four countries of study having made significant progress. This points to important improvements in MSWM in these countries. However, when examining the percentage of treated waste that is recycled in proportion to the waste that is disposed of in a landfill (see Figure 9), it is clear that more progress is needed. Landfilling is still the favored approach in Romania and Bulgaria; yet, Croatia and Poland have made substantial progress towards increasing their rates of recycling. 49 https://www.eea.europa.eu/ims/waste-recycling-in-europe 50 https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/waste-and-recycling_en 51 https://ec.europa.eu/environment/topics/waste-and-recycling_en 52 Bridging the Gap in Solid Waste Management: Governance Requirements for Results, pg. xiii 53 Bridging the Gap in Solid Waste Management: Governance Requirements for Results, pg. xiii 48 Figure 8: Municipal waste recycling rates in Europe by country54 Figure 9: Waste Treatment by Type of Recovery and Disposal in the EU, 2018 (% of total treatment) 55 54 https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/indicators/waste-recycling-1/assessment-1 55 https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php?title=Waste_statistics#Total_waste_generation 49 Romania, Croatia, Poland and Bulgaria have been allocated significant funding for capital investments from the EU; yet this funding is finite and should not be over relied upon. Between 2007-2013 EUR 2.45 billion in EU grants were allocated for Waste Management investments in the 4 countries over 2014-2021 EUR 5.8 billion was allocated - yet only EUR 1.65 billion was absorbed. (Figure 10). Most current investments in the past two cycles have been funded by ERDF or cohesion funds, or various donor funds, but funding usually covers only the first phase of investments for maybe five years. However, when international grant funding becomes scarce, large tariff increases or unsustainable borrowing will be inevitable in the countries of study, since it is unlikely that donors would provide more grant funding for landfill capacity expansion after financing the initial upgrade from a dump site to a compliant landfill. This overreliance on EU funding is indicative of some of the constraints in the financing and cost-recovery enabling environment in these countries.56 Figure 10: EU Fund allocation towards Solid Waste in the four countries (2014-2021 Programming period)57 Source: In profile: EU support to waste management | Data | European Structural and Investment Funds (europa.eu) One of the most important challenges facing these countries is a short-term focus on capturing grant resources for “hard� investments, which results in sub-optimal use of resources. While this strategy can maximize resource inflows into the local economy, it also provides incentives for economically sub- optimal investment size. According to EU officials, in Bulgaria, almost half the 23 regional landfill systems established to date serve fewer than 100,000 people—much lower than generally seen as economic minimum; and many of the 55 landfills planned will not exceed that average. By constructing more landfills than necessary, Bulgaria avoids difficult inter-municipal negotiations around site selection, but incurs 56World Bank. Solid Waste Management in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland and Romania: A cross-country analysis of sector challenges towards EU harmonization. 2011 50 higher than necessary future operating costs. In 5 to 10 years, reinvesting in additional cells without the benefit of structural grants will likely be unaffordable and this approach will need to be revised.58 Current revenues for waste collection and landfilling should cover all costs for operation and maintenance, including the cost for landfill closure and re-cultivation. Yet, while all four countries have applied the polluter-pays principle, most tariffs are too low to reach cost-recovery levels. Typically, tariffs are set at the local level, but municipal councils resist increasing fees due to low willingness to pay in the population. Potential means for cost reduction have not been fully explored, and potential efficiency gains from private sector participation are not yet fully leveraged. In Poland, the unresolved issue of waste ownership under prevailing legislation diminishes sector financial sustainability because private operators pocket earnings from waste collection in profitable areas, while public municipal companies mostly serve the less profitable routes. Private operators, where they exist, usually collect sufficient revenues to cover current operations, but rarely enough for investment because most PPP contracts included an upfront subsidy to cover initial investments, but no reserve mechanisms for future investments. For landfills, the up-front subsidy from IPA or other pre-accession funds typically covered the first cell or two, but after these cells are full, the future of the landfill is unknown. Thus, operating costs appear to be covered but in many cases they are not.59 The legal framework and institutional set-up in the solid waste management sector is influenced by EU practice; and is therefore similar in all the countries. The Waste Framework Directive (WFD) provides guiding principles outlining the rules and requirements to be fulfilled by all member countries in solid waste management. The 4 countries have all drafted national waste management strategies (NWMSs), however they are not always consistent across government levels. Most strategies include central government policy guidelines developed by the Ministry of Environment (MoE). All strategies include comprehensive approaches that translate EU policies on solid waste management into national approaches and adopted key EU guidelines—polluter-pays, priority waste reduction and recycling, and regional approaches to integrated solid waste management. However, in the countries of focus, waste management strategies are not always consistent across government levels with the roles and responsibilities between regions, counties, and ministries of regional development unclear. For example, Poland’s institutional framework conveys substantial discretion to the 16 regional governments (Voivodships) to manage their waste strategies. Often, priorities differ among Voivodships, and a lack of coherence among different government levels leads to a lack of clear sector policy guidelines for municipalities. Additionally, the Ministry of Regional Development has lead responsibility to prioritize capital investments for solid waste management, while the Ministry of Environment is responsible for sector policy, which multiplies inconsistencies. These inconsistencies undermine cost efficiency, which depends on integrated systems and robust regional arrangements.60 Regional sanitary landfills and treatment facilities are the backbone of integrated, environmentally sound, and financially viable solid waste management. To address the institutional challenge of developing integrated regional-level systems, the legal framework should provide for strong, functioning 58 Ibid 59 Ibid 60 World Bank. Solid Waste Management in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland and Romania: A cross-country analysis of sector challenges towards EU harmonization. 2011 51 inter-municipal entities, such as associations, to establish or contract operators; or, as in Croatia, convey solid waste management legal obligations to regional authorities (counties). In Bulgaria, regional associations were intended to lead regional waste management planning and administration, but the regional associations were created at the national level, and the associations are weak, barely operational, and face strong opposition from local authorities. In Poland, regional self-governments have substantial discretion, including legislative power, but in practice this has led to overlap of responsibilities leaving municipalities and regional associations reluctant to act to fulfill their roles. Complexity is multiplied by numerous other stakeholders, including the private sector, and NGOs.61 Limited data collection and monitoring & evaluation of that data from which to adjust MSWM practice in an informed manner hamper enforcement. Across all countries, operators are obligated to report to the municipal or regional contracting authority, which transmits data to the Ministry of Environment (Bulgaria and Romania), or an Environmental Protection Agency (Croatia). Often, national statistical institutes store and process the data. However, MSWM efforts in all countries suffer from lack of reliable data as reporting obligations, data collection, and data processing are neglected. Access to data remains poor, and public debates are not based on reliable information. For example, most landfills operate without weigh scales and therefore cannot report accurately on waste streams.62 In particular, no reliable data are available on costs and revenues, a basic requirement to organize a national transition to EU compliance. On the revenue side, fees for waste collection can be part of local taxation, such as in Bulgaria; or fees can be collected directly by a private operator, as in Romania and Poland; or sometimes fees are included in general local taxes. When municipalities provide waste services directly, costs are often untraceable within municipal accounts that lack cost center accounting and include un-reconciled arrears. Private operators, in turn, rarely disclose revenues. Available cost and revenue estimates vary widely across the countries of study. According to a study that conducted site visits, tipping fees, fees paid by anyone who disposes of waste in a landfill, range from a few Euros per ton, e.g. in Gorna Malitsa (Bulgaria), a town of 15,000 on the periphery of Sofia, to about EUR 40 in Zagreb (Croatia).63 In the countries of study, public feedback and complaint mechanisms are not yet widely institutionalized. Siting regional sanitary landfills heavily depends on proactive public consultation and information; and reducing landfill waste can only be achieved with public education campaigns to promote the individual and collective benefits of sorting and recycling. However, in the countries of study, the opportunity to reduce political risk through informed public debates during siting and operation of regional landfills is insufficiently recognized. Instead, industry active in the more profitable part of waste recycling appears to be the main driver of public communication campaigns to extol the benefits of sorting and separating waste. Some Environment ministries lead national public communication campaigns, but environmental funds, where they exist and are functional, such as the Environmental Protection and Energy Efficiency Fund (EPEEF) in Croatia, are more prominent in public education.64 61 Ibid 62 Ibid 63 World Bank. Solid Waste Management in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland and Romania: A cross-country analysis of sector challenges towards EU harmonization. 2011 64 Ibid 52 The disconnection between the aspirations of the central government on waste management and the ability of the local level to meet these aspirations through their local waste management services reflects a gap in institutional frameworks and enabling environment in these countries . To this end, some of the key gaps in the waste management enabling environment that have been identified in Romania, Croatia, Bulgaria and Poland include: • Legal and Institutional Enabling Environment: o Weak legal mandate and policy guidance for municipalities o Lack of coherent roles and responsibilities across different levels of government (e.g. for planning and implementation of waste management plans) • Financing and Economic Incentives o Economic sustainability and cost recovery for solid waste operations is insufficient o Private sector is not incentivized to participate in the solid waste sector • Data and Monitoring & Evaluation Framework o Waste management performance monitoring and data collection are limited o Enforcement capacity on environmental standards is low o Scarcity of reliable data • Public participation and stakeholder engagement o Public feedback and complaint mechanisms are not yet widely institutionalized65 The table below provides a more detailed summary per country: Table 3: Major MSWM Performance Shortcomings and Possible Areas of Intervention in the Countries of Study 65 Solid Waste Management in Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland, and Romania, pg. 12 53 What can be done about it? 1. Policy and Legislation: Operationalize the national waste management plans • Increase central-level implementation capacity. Dramatic improvements required by EU targets need a strong top-down push in the form of adequate program management, planning, and incentives, but central-level capacity is insufficient to operationalize national strategies. Central ministries require enough staff to operate effectively, with realistic plans, measurable targets, and intermediate deadlines. However, building central-level capacity does not mean a return to old-style central planning. For example, in Bulgaria, during the first phase of implementing the national waste management plan, fund absorption was slow, so during the second phase, Government opted to allocate funds for regional sanitary landfills at the national level and the Ministry of Environment even participated in landfill site selection. While this may assist municipalities during the preparation phase, lack of local ownership will likely delay implementation and may cause future issues with the local population, whose support will be needed when landfills begin to accept larger waste volumes from other regions. • Strengthen inter-municipal entities for regional waste management. Integrated solid waste management depends on effective regional-level implementation and coordination. International experience demonstrates that strong inter-municipal entities are crucial for regional planning and service administration. They require a solid institutional, technical, and financial operational base, and often operate through a regional public company that has sufficient autonomy and resources, supervised by the founding municipalities. Assistance is needed to establish strong, negotiated inter- municipal agreements as the ‘institutional backbone’ of regional integrated solid waste management systems. These agreements need to specify responsibilities, distribute risks, and share benefits among signing parties. 2. Institutions and Capacity: Improve institutional arrangements • Build strong enforcement capacities. Compliance with the prevailing environmental legislation is usually best enforced through legally independent bodies that may act on their own initiative and take appropriate enforcement actions through fees and other sanctions, including prosecution. Enforcement has the clear objective to avoid possibly high fines as a result of EU infringement procedures for non-compliance; but in addition, effective enforcement is essential to set the right incentives for the responsible authorities and their contracted operators to plan, implement, and maintain an integrated solid waste management system. Also, it provides the public with a mechanism to deal with complaints from citizens; and in the long run increases acceptance for final disposal and other waste treatment solutions. • Increase local ownership. Ambitious national waste management plans have not yet been fully translated into regional and local plans. Local authorities, the main drivers for implementation, have yet to assume the level of ownership required for ambitious plans that include significant infrastructure investments, politically sensitive landfill site selection, and tariff increases. Building municipal-level momentum will require additional incentives for better performers, and increasing 54 sanctions for non-compliance and worse performers; but also better public communication and outreach campaigns to engage the local population. • Allocate more time and resources for site selection procedures. Good practice in integrating Strategic environmental assessment (EA) at early stages and environmental impact assessment (EIA) at later stages throughout the site selection process for landfills or other waste management facilities has been developed and is practiced today in Ireland following many years of difficult lessons learned from a system that once relied heavily on the political process. A landmark landfill site selection case in Dublin was a wake-up call for officials to recognize that the process of site selection must be de- politicized. As a result, Parliament removed authority for solid waste site selection decisions from local level politicians and transferred it to higher-level technical authorities. Ireland also implemented national good practice guidelines for sequencing technical studies to assess landfill site options in conjunction with SEA: conduct a robust EIA that provides an ‘alternatives analysis’ on short-listed sites with strong public involvement; and conduct a site-specific EIA with public involvement linked to the environmental permitting process. These national guidelines emphasize the importance of a technically sound iterative process that incorporates public involvement at each step. Higher up-front costs and a longer time frame ultimately pay off because the decision making process moves forward and does not get reversed. Waste incineration schemes can be particularly challenging in this respect, as their development faces strong public opposition. Planning process and consultation procedures should be carefully designed and may take considerable time. 3. Financial : Progress towards medium-term economic and financial sustainability • Increase the share and improve the conditions of private participation in service provision. Participation of private providers in waste management services can benefit the system as a whole. Public budgets are spared necessary investments in MSWM systems, private enterprises can bring innovations and good management expertise into play, they decrease the possibility of patronage politics, and they make the provider directly accountable to the clients—especially in situations in which the government offers no subsidies for service provision. Well written contracts with adequate risk apportionment that are tendered through transparent mechanisms, can also greatly contribute to improving the cost-efficiency of the system as a whole. • Where possible, link service level improvements to tariffs increase. Governments often subsidize service provision through low tariffs to ensure access to affordable services for low income groups. However, by doing so, they can make waste management unattractive to private enterprises that do not want to be at the whim of the public sector; and providers often end up being accountable to policy makers rather than to their clients. Since politicians often keep waste management fees below recovery costs for short-term political gain, they can make service providers dependent on central government grants and/or on un-penalized service cutbacks. At the same time, it becomes even more difficult to adjust tariffs at a later stage when they cannot be justified with improvements in the quality of the service. Further sources of additional revenues or cost reductions can also be sought by improving the recycling levels. Although all four countries have a vibrant recycling sector, stronger public education and outreach is required to reach targets. 55 • Seek additional revenue sources or cost reductions by improving recycling levels. Bulgaria, Croatia, Poland, and Romania each have a private recycling sector, but stronger public education and outreach is required to reach targets. • Define clear affordability limits. In many countries, lower income groups bear a disproportionate share of inefficient services and tend to pay higher prices than more affluent households. Since they often do not benefit from economies of scale and network externalities (e.g. in rural areas), and are often taken advantage of by individual providers (especially when one provider has the service monopoly in the area), they not only have to spend a higher share of their budget on services, but they also tend to receive poorer services. Central or regional governments can help poor jurisdictions to solve this problem by bringing them together and helping them form a common front for negotiating with individual providers. Air Quality Why Air Quality matters in the quest for sustainable cities As urban areas have higher levels of most pollutants, and a growing proportion of Europe’s population live in urban settings, there is a strong justification to focus the development of interventions to address air quality within cities. Air pollution is a significant cause of premature death and morbidity, representing the single largest environmental health risk in Europe. People in larger cities tend to be exposed to higher levels of nitrogen dioxide due to emissions from road traffic. In central and eastern Europe, air quality is poor in many areas, especially in urban settings, and the burning of solid fuels for domestic heating and in industry results in public exposure to the highest concentrations of particulate matter and polycyclic hydrocarbons. Cities are also subject to pollution arising from sources outside of the urban scale, such as agriculture, and transport of pollutants over many hundreds of kilometers arising from other countries, both of which urban authorities may have no control over. Measures to improve air quality can have significant co-benefits for other areas including (but not limited to) climate change (reduced emissions of greenhouse gases), noise and water quality . In addition, actions in these areas can also have co-benefits for air quality if designed appropriately, although there can be disbenefits if certain measures are adopted without consideration for air quality (e.g. the historic push and subsidies for use of diesel vehicles, biomass burning, etc). The overall air quality policy and strategies of the EU are directed towards meeting the air quality guideline values of the World Health Organization (WHO) in the coming decades. EU air pollution policy follows a twin-track approach: by setting legal limits for concentrations of air pollutants and by establishing agreements and standards to reduce emissions at source, i.e. national emission reduction commitments (total emissions) and sector-specific sources. Whilst EU policy provides a strong framework for air quality management, EU Member States, and local and regional governments within them, are expected to take further actions in order to be able to meet the air quality standards and reduce the health impacts of air pollution. 56 What are the trends in the 4 countries currently, and what contributes to these? Whilst air quality has generally improved across the EU, there are still many cities where the standards set in the Ambient Air Quality Directives (AAQD) for the protection of human health are exceeded. The principal pollutants of concern are nitrogen dioxide (NO2), fine particulate matter (PM10 and PM2.5) and ozone. Within eastern European cities, concentrations of carcinogenic Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (including Benzo(a)Pyrene, BaP) are also of concern. The current air quality status for each of the countries considered within this report is summarized below: ➢ Bulgaria is one of the EU Member States with the poorest air quality in urban areas, with high levels of urban population exposure to particulate matter resulting in significant pollution-related deaths and years of life lost. According to the European Environment Agency (EEA), air pollution was responsible for about 14,000 premature deaths in Bulgaria in 2015. Bulgaria has twice been referred to the Court of Justice of the European Union (most recently in December 2020) for continued exceedances of the annual and daily mean limit values for PM10. ➢ For Croatia, the EEA estimated that in 2015, around 5,000 premature deaths could be attributed to air pollution. Croatia has reported a number of exceedances of the EU air quality limit and target values including those set for PM10, PM2.5 and BaP. As a result of these infringements, the European Commission has urged Croatia to take additional actions to comply (October 2020), and noted that measures taken to minimize air pollution were insufficient to keep exceedance periods as short as possible. ➢ Poland has some of the most polluted cities in the EU with some of the highest concentrations of PM10 and PM2.5. The EEA estimated that in 2019 close to 50,000 premature deaths were attributable to exposure to air pollution. Poland was referred to the Court of Justice of the EU by the European Commission in 2015 over continued exceedance of the daily mean limit value for PM10, and was ruled to be in breach of its obligations in 2018. Moreover, BaP Target Values have been continuously exceeded throughout the Polish territory; BaP is strongly associated with poorly controlled combustion, such as domestic coal burning. ➢ For Romania, the EEA estimated that in 2015, around 27,000 premature deaths were attributable to exposure to air pollution. Concerns have been raised that the issue of air pollution is being underestimated due to inadequate monitoring in the country. The European Commission has sent formal letters (in 2017 and again in 2019) to Romania concerning systemic failures to monitor pollution across its territory in compliance with the AAQD. In addition, the Commission referred Romania to the European Court of Justice in 2018 for exceeding PM10 levels, and separately in 2021 for failing to produce a National Air Pollution Control Programme as required by the National Emissions Reduction Commitments Directive. Within cities, the principal local sources of pollution are road traffic and domestic / commercial / industrial combustion. For road transport, the vehicle fleets in the cities and countries considered within this report are typically much older than the EU average and there has been very limited uptake of low emission and electric vehicles. The latter appears to be due to a lack of financial incentives for the purchase of such vehicles as well as limited supporting infrastructure e.g. charging points for electric vehicles. This is further exacerbated by sprawling urban growth patterns that lock in the need for 57 motorized transport. For domestic/commercial/industrial combustion, the main challenge relates to the continued use of high levels of solid fuels (e.g. coal) for heating leading to high levels of air pollution and smog events during the heating season. National-regional-local governance structures vary considerably between countries, as do the powers and responsibilities devolved to the city scale. Local and regional authorities do not always feel enabled and/or have the necessary capacity and resources to take further necessary actions. There are many challenges to improving air quality in urban areas. These include: • Lack of collaboration and knowledge sharing between different levels of governance at the local, regional and national scales • The failure to translate ambitious EU or national policies to practicable local actions to drive expected reduction in emissions • Governance issues, particularly at the local level where further actions required to improve air quality are impeded by mandate limits, uncertainties, and lack of political will • Lack of public acceptance and overcoming challenges to mitigation measures • Lack of guidance or local capacity (human resources and financial) to evaluate and implement interventions at the local level. In order to effectively develop and implement air quality policies, it is important that national, regional and local authorities can deliver on their own tasks and work effectively with each other within a multi- level governance system. Whilst there is already a well-developed policy framework in place (albeit with a need for further local, regional and/or national actions), there are a number of challenges in relation to institutional capacity and governance. The European Commission’s Environmental Implementation Review (EIR)66 has identified – for some of the countries considered in this report – major governance issues linked to government effectiveness and regulatory quality. Issues related to rule of law and control of corruption have also been identified in some of the countries. Furthermore, limited resources within local municipalities can impact on their ability to develop and implement effective policies and take actions to improve air quality. Finally, challenges with information sharing and co-ordination (between government bodies at all levels and with other stakeholders) have been identified What can be done about it? Tackling air pollution successfully requires a mix of policies and investments, including complementary ‘sticks and carrots’. No single approach will be able to reduce air pollution from all sources. Air quality management is complex and requires national, regional and local level actors to be working in harmony. A good starting point is to ensure that each of these structures has the resources, knowledge, and incentive to engage and take action, and is subsequently held accountable against measurable outcomes. 66 https://ec.europa.eu/environment/eir/index_en.htm 58 1. Policy and Legislation: • More targeted local policies in context of national and supra-national frameworks. There is a broad body of EU legislation covering air quality and emissions – including source specific regulations – which has been transposed into national legislation. This provides an effective framework for managing and improving air quality. However, there appears to be some gaps in relation to compliance with this legislation (e.g. exceedances of EU air quality standards) primarily due to limitations in the development and implementation of additional context-responsive local, regional and national policies and measures to supplement and support EU policy. For example, in a number of cities in the countries considered in this deep dive, the limit values for NO2 and PM10 are exceeded due to road transport and domestic heating sources, and the target values for PAH are exceeded due to solid fuel use in domestic heating and energy generation. Whilst EU policy provides some contribution to reducing emissions from these sources (e.g. EURO vehicle emission standards for new vehicles), further local (and/or national) measures are required in order to further reduce emissions . For domestic heating sources, there are a number of possible policies and measures that could be considered, including the following: o Banning the burning of all solid fuels in domestic properties (or poor-quality solid fuels as part of a phase out); this could be implemented via a ban on the sale of such fuels to domestic customers. o Grants and/or other incentives to support the replacement of solid fuel boilers / stoves with gas or electric boilers / stoves or implementation of district heating schemes, focusing initially on older stoves and boilers that do not meet the European Eco-design standards. For road transport, there are a number of additional measures that could be considered, including the following: o Policies and measures to increase the uptake of low emission and electric vehicles, such as: ▪ Scrappage schemes to incentivize phase-out of the older, more polluting vehicles. ▪ Low emission / clean air zones restricting all, or the most polluting vehicles, from air quality hotspots. ▪ Grants and/or other incentives (e.g. differential taxation) to incentivize the purchase of low emission or fully electric vehicles. ▪ Investments in the necessary infrastructure to support switching to electric vehicles (e.g. charging infrastructure) o Policies and measures to reduce vehicle activity, such as: ▪ Improvements to public transport systems. ▪ Improved cycling and walking infrastructure. ▪ Communication and education schemes. ▪ Adoption of compact and mixed-use urban planning approaches. • Better integrated policies at local level. For both road transport and domestic sources mentioned above,, a number of the policies and measures described above could be considered in combination, for example the introduction of a low emission zone combined with financial incentives to support the purchase of low emission vehicles. 59 • Ensure that the required monitoring, modelling and emissions assessment tools are available at the city scale. European legislation also requires minimum standards in terms of the quality and quantity of air quality monitoring, but concerns have been raised that these minimum standards are not being met in some of the countries considered in this deep dive. A greater range of evidence support tools are required to develop and successfully direct interventions to improve air quality, to ensure they are targeted at the areas of greatest need. While there is some evidence that these tools are being supported, such as a forthcoming small sensor network in Warsaw, greater assistance will be needed in this regard. 2. Institutions and capacities • Increased human and financial resources at the municipality level to ensure they can prepare and implement effective air quality action plans and measures. Increased resources can also support municipalities with accessing wider funding sources due to the complexity and resources required for applications e.g. for European structural funds. • Sharing of resources between municipalities including access to relevant tools (e.g. for air quality modelling and emission inventories). This could include the establishment of centralized shared toolkits, materials and/or training materials. • Capacity building support to improve technical capabilities for air quality assessment and management e.g. for modelling and emissions inventories, designing new policies. • Improve vertical (between different levels of government) and horizontal (across municipalities) coordination and information sharing to ensure a coordinated approach to tackling air quality and ensuring maximum co-benefits e.g. for climate change. This should also include providing municipalities with clarity on legal powers and the basis by which they can take action to improve air quality. • Improve stakeholder awareness and engagement, including information campaigns, direct engagement and provision of air quality data (e.g. via air quality indices). This should include more collaborative engagement with NGOs and other relevant stakeholders who can support the development and implementation of policies and measures. Effective communication to the public and other relevant stakeholders is necessary to gain “buy-in� to any new measures and the benefits they may bring. 3. Financing • Sufficient funding for any new policies and measures (e.g. stove replacement programs) identified and accessed ahead of implementation to ensure success. For the two main sources of relevance for the cities considered within this report (i.e. domestic solid fuel burning and road transport), any additional measures to be taken will have implications for the general public as they require individuals to make changes – at a cost – to the way they travel, the vehicle they drive and/or the way in which they heat their homes. Potential funding sources are likely to include EU funds and/or national resources. 60 • Funding made available and distributed in an efficient and effective manner and allocated based on clear prioritization and eligibility criteria and capacity at a local level . Some of these funds could be allocated for a financial instruments scheme with preferential loans or loan guarantees being made available to eligible households. This could help to leverage additional funding from a range of other sources including private investors and international financial institutions. Income-based graduated grant schemes and related financial instruments should be considered to help support and protect low-income households that may be unable to pay e.g. for replacement of stoves. Fiscal incentives in the form of income tax credits or rebates/deductions for investments made in eligible stoves or vehicles, coupled with financial support mechanisms (such as partial grant financing) and financial instruments (such as preferential loans) should be considered to further incentivize uptake and replacement of stoves and vehicles. 61 Key findings and Recommendations While many cities have signaled their intent to adopt a greener development path (i.e. signing up as voluntary members of the Covenant of Mayors), results pointing towards more sustainable cities are not yet fully evident in the countries considered in this study. Enhancing cities’ sustainability is a complex ambition to be pursued and achieving success in even just one subset of one block of the framework (such as spatial planning or Solid Waste Management) is complex in itself. Many strategies and plans have been drafted, but as the dashboards and deep dives highlighted, moving from planning to implementation is a big leap and a difficult task, even for financially well-endowed city administrations. A number of common themes and recurring issues are noted throughout the various sections from these high-level findings. The corresponding recommendations are summarized below: Moving city management systems towards results-based approaches The analysis showed that largely, the systems comprising the enabling conditions for sustainable cities are in place, but there seems to be a disconnect between inputs (the systems in place) and results (city performance). There is a general presence of strategies, laws, and processes (e.g., a strategy to encourage sustainability, a process to prioritize capital investments), but this is not translating into significant positive results in the outcome-oriented dimensions (People & Economy and the Environment). Creating a municipal financing and management system that focuses and incentivizes improvements in cities’ performance (e.g. achieving performance targets on greening cities) rather than inputs (e.g. providing trainings for the cities to write a project proposal for available funds), would represent a significant shift in current practice. Cities have been largely reactive to the EU funding cycles, crafting strategies and projects that maximize their chance of accessing earmarked funds from donors such as the EU. In the context of capacity constraints at the local level, such focus on external funding mobilization left little room to enhance quality of strategies, plans, and projects to best meet the local needs and for the funding to be executed optimally. As local governments heavily rely on central fiscal transfers and EU funding to fund their functions, incorporating incentives and support mechanisms for local governments to adopt results-based management (RBM) in the overall municipal financing system will be critical to facilitate greater focus on results. RBM can not only help improve service delivery and regulatory results, but also enhance local accountability by enabling the identification and monitoring of city performance by local stakeholders. Harnessing such local accountability can facilitate the local government performance improvement effort to be well-anchored onto local needs and sustained. Differentiated approaches to local capacity development Several sectoral analyses point to weak local government capacity as one of the key constraints to making progress towards addressing sustainability challenges. The ongoing practice of assigning more and more responsibility to the local level further constrains the local government capacity, particularly since such decentralization of functional assignments has not been accompanied by sufficient decentralization of revenue assignments and capacity development support. Meanwhile, available capacity development support from the national government and donors tends to be limited to a narrow 62 set of local capacity to meet requirements to access external funding (e.g. trainings to prepare green city strategies as a pre-condition for a response to call for proposals). To incentivize and enable greater local government performance in sustainability agenda, different approaches are necessary in local capacity development. Blanket terms like ‘local government capacity’ can mean very different things in different contexts and to different stakeholders. What is however clear from this assessment is that there are likely multiple dimensions of local government capacity that requires greater intervention, and that depending on the nature of the constraint different approaches can be deployed to address it. Below are some specific areas of challenge that might offer different entry points or focus areas for capacity building efforts: • poor quality of local strategies and plans. Although plans are in place these do not ensure that resources and developments result in addressing the most pressing local development needs. This could be attributed to a lack of analytical and strategic planning skills within local government; • identified and planned projects, with available financing, do not advance through technical and engineering design phases. This could point to a lack of technical engineering and infrastructure project management skills; • approved, financed and technically designed projects are not moving through procurement processes. This could point to financial management capacity constraints or inefficient public procurement systems; • local government budgets and available own funds are not sufficient to meet co-financing requirements for large scale projects. This could point to financial capacity constraints (e.g. suboptimal collection of property tax) or poor financial planning practices. There is further a need for a differentiated investment and capacity building approach for growing (usually larger) and shrinking (usually smaller) cities. The long-term sustainability of cities that are losing population should be of great concern to national governments and requires careful consideration and support programs. Such shrinking cities will increasingly face service delivery and financing challenges as their revenue base erodes and infrastructure maintenance costs increase. The sustainability of urban growth form for the limited number of growing cities should be equally of concern, as the cities appear to sprawl more than the rate of population growth. These different sets of cities have unique features, face different challenges and require differentiated support. In addition to cascading national climate and green targets down to local level and incentivize greater local accountability and results, the targeting of performance improvement areas and capacity development support from the central level needs to be tailored to the different conditions of shrinking and growing cities. A stronger focus on financial sustainability of local governments Funds flowing through EU programs have greatly supported in advancing sustainable development and green goals. This is seen not only in the availability of investment funds, but also in how systems and practices have been improved over time. One concern however is that at city level investments could be driven by the availability of funds rather than actual local development needs (i.e. a mismatch between local needs and actual investments). Unbridled capital investment and uncontained urban expansion, even in light of demographic decline, could lead to collapse of local systems and investments, not to mention adverse environmental impacts. In addition, currently little attention is paid to the life cycle- 63 costing implications of the funded infrastructure investments. The investment projects are not prioritized considering operation and maintenance costs, creating potentially unsustainable financial burdens for cities which are grappling with declining populations. However, more attention is required to the financial sustainability of local services and investments in the context of overall declining population. Declining population across the four countries places increased fiscal pressure on cities (especially those which are shrinking) in providing basic services amid a diminishing tax base. This pressure is further exacerbated by the suboptimal local revenue performance and the lack of local willingness and/or ability to enhance local tax yields (e.g. betterment tax introduction in Poland, tourism tax in Croatia). The suboptimum local revenue performance is a function of weak capacity in the areas such as financial data management. Taking an example of SWM services, when municipalities provide waste services directly, costs are often untraceable within municipal accounts that lack cost center accounting and include unreconciled arrears. The achievement of national sustainability goals or climate targets is directly related to the ability of local government to deliver basic services in an efficient and green way. This service delivery can only take place if local governments are firstly operational and not in financial distress. Enhanced vertical and horizontal cooperation Inter-jurisdictional planning and service delivery practices (i.e. horizontal coordination) require strengthening at local level. In efforts towards greater efficiency, several countries have moved towards greater regional service delivery, for example in areas such as water and MSWM. While this is admirable in theory, adjacent localities have not always been able to cooperate successfully. Cooperation in the form interjurisdictional planning and investment is particularly essential for larger growing urban areas where the negative results of sprawling urban form are very clear. It is also evident in cases where several strategies, plans, programs, and projects target the same geographic territory based on opportunity (particularly funding) without coordination towards a common vision. Though this report did not consider the potentially supporting role of regional government in the city sustainability agenda, it is a topic for potential further exploration. In order to realize sustainability goals, significant improvement is required in coordination and information sharing between different levels of government (vertical coordination). This study demonstrates the very wide range of issues of importance, even in a simplified framework, when thinking about city level sustainability. This complexity is often mirrored in the number of government ministries and departments mandated to deal with this range of issues. It places an even greater demand on local level as the pressure point where these strands must come together for integrated development in a specific locality. Limited local capacity has already been discussed and the plethora of disconnected plans and strategies, both at different spatial levels (local, regional, functional areas, larger territories, etc.) and across many sectors (spatial, transport, climate, etc.) is symptomatic of the highly fragmented systems. While there is no simple solution and this report does not advocate for super ministries or single master plans, alternatives must be considered to ensure improved coordination and a greater flow of information in both directions (local to national and vice versa). National policy ambitions and program results are ultimately realized in conscious or unconscious tradeoff decisions made at local level. 64 There are many examples of city level best practice in each of the countries studied and greater knowledge sharing amongst peer cities could significantly advance the adoption of such good practices. Many of the knowledge initiatives outlined in the opening chapter focus strongly on building intra- European knowledge sharing network; what is less clear is how the knowledge gained by a few cities in one country is further shared through engagements with other cities in the same country. The role of Associations of Municipalities and other technical communities of practice are often undervalued in this regard. In addition to convening on topics of mutual interest to multiple local governments, a further step would involve convening across disciplines (i.e. planning and transport, or planning and finance) to start bridging the gaps that make integrated development planning virtually impossible in practice. Data availability, monitoring and evaluation Closely related to the issue of moving towards results-based approaches is the availability of data to actually monitor performance. City level data is virtually non-existent in aggregate data platforms such as Eurostat, and national statistics sites do not tend to offer significantly more in terms of granularity. Once regional or country level data is utilized in analysis, city level comparison is not possible within countries as consideration of higher units of spatial analysis can group cities within the same region and eliminate variability. 67 Comparison of cities across countries is limited due to differences in indicator definitions between national statistics sites. Strengthening data collection at the local level can lead to better identification of problems and inform targeted policy planning. Further, it can also help keep implementation on track and provide the means for monitoring and evaluation. Larger cities are investing in their own monitoring systems, dashboards and data platforms, and there is an emergence of more open data platforms. A more coordinated approach to city level data collection and sharing in each country could be encouraged. Numerous cities worldwide are taking increased measures to strengthen their strategic management with more intensive use of data to better meet the growing expectations of their citizens and drive progress towards sustainability.68 The increasingly pivotal role of new technologies and strategic data use by municipal governments can improve delivery capabilities and help achieve monitoring and progress towards the realization of sustainable cities. For cities seeking to strengthen data collection, several possibilities exist, whether adopting ISO standards, collecting ESPON and OECD indicators of SDGs at the city level, or consulting the U4SSC’s Collection Methodology for Key Performance Indicators for Smart Sustainable Cities69 as well as the European Commission’s Handbook for SDG Voluntary Local Reviews. Disaster Risk Management and Resilience at local level One area that is of definite concern is that of Disaster resilience at local level (and particularly smaller localities), where dashboards highlighted that most cities do not even perform against the basic input 67 Shifting the spatial unit of analysis upwards also captures characteristics of populations beyond those considered “urban“ or directly under the administrative boundaries of a city, and as such should be interpreted with caution. 68 For a condensed analysis of 12 such case cities in the world, including Boston, Seoul and London, and in the region, Buenos Aires, Medellin, Mexico and Recife, see the study by CAF – Development Bank of Latin America, presented CAF – Development Bank of Latin America (2021). Governar_a_Cidade_na_Era_dos_Dados: Delivery Units 2.0 (Portuguese). Governar_a_Cidade_na_Era_dos_Dados_Delivery_Units_20.pdf (caf.com) 69 https://www.itu.int/en/publications/Documents/tsb/2017-U4SSC-Collection-Methodology/mobile/index.html 65 indicators (i.e. no plans or strategies in place). Given the COVID-19 pandemic response and the devastating impacts of multiple disasters at the same time (i.e. flooding in Germany, earthquakes in Croatia), this is an area that should be highlighted for action. The most recent State of City Climate Finance report70 found that flows of urban mitigation finance (to reduce or avoid greenhouse gas emissions) far outweigh those of urban adaptation finance (to respond to climate related risks). While not further explored in detail in this study, this is an area that requires urgent attention in the context of EU funding and sustainability of local government finances. While progress has been made in the regulatory environment at national level, it should be noted again that local governments face significant constraints in capacity to prepare and implement their local Disaster Protection Plans (DPP), citing shortages of financial, human and technical resources. This is a significant hurdle to mainstreaming prevention and preparedness into urban planning and local development management. 70 https://www.climatepolicyinitiative.org/publication/the-state-of-cities-climate-finance/ 66 Annex 1: Sustainable Cities Quantitative Indicator List The format and indicators presented in this report are subject to corrections and updates, and as more information is provided and new sources of data become available, the list of indicators will evolve . Standardized indicators obtained via Eurostat were employed to the extent possible; however, in recognition of varying data availability at national sources and the general paucity of data at city level, additional proxy indicators were considered separately by country according to the data availability at local level in order to glean a meaningful look into the state of play for cities in each country. Therefore, comparability of cities between cities in different countries – and even in some cases within the same country (e.g. between capital cities and secondary cities) – is limited. While this may seem a limitation, it allows the tool to make full use of the already limited data available. Guidance for other relevant indicators in European cities may be found in the Handbook for SDG Voluntary Local Reviews. Target values were sourced from the EU SDG Localizing tool, SDGs in European cities, and the OECD measuring the distance to the SDGs in regions and cities. For indicators where target values were not immediately available, these were developed by reflecting against the distance from respective national averages or EU averages. As differing indicator definitions and proxies tend to require different target values, target values for each proxy indicator were carefully considered and accordingly benchmarked against national, EU, or OECD targets or averages, where available. This led to each dashboard being customized to the country and category of city (capital vs. secondary) within the country. Setting target values is a key component of the exercise. If cities are to adopt their own target values, they should be established in accordance with local frameworks, and the use of the tool could potentially be expanded to set target values in accordance with cities. If target values may prove difficult to define, this may be a point for discussion with cities and can potentially provide a means of encouraging local administrations to set their own target values. It may also be useful to establish baselines for each city and evaluate performance by percentage reductions or increases of indicators against those baselines. The use of absolute measures can also enable the comparison of one area to another for those seeking to do so. General descriptive statistics for each city were also collected as part of the analysis. While not a part of the assessment indicator set, these initial key background statistics help to provide insight to a city’s profile, characterize its trends and conditions in demographic, economic, and spatial terms against relative to other cities within the same country. These background statistics helped to provide context for the evaluation and also informed the country notes. 67 Unit of Quantitative Block Sub-themes Indicator Description meas SDG Indicators ureme nt Home-ownership (% of home ownership as total number of rates dwellings) unit 11.1 Housing availability, ownership and # of unoccupied conventional tenure Vacancy rate dwellings/total number of units unit 11.1 Percentage of households without Tenure insecurity registered legal titles % 1.4.2 Median mortgage burden (principal Housing cost as a repayment and interest payments) or rent percentage of burden (private market and subsidized income (rent or rent) as a share of disposable income, in Housing affordability mortgage) percent, 2019 or latest year available % 1.4.2; 11 Percentage of dwellings provided with Percentage of social subsidies by public administration against PEOPLE & Affordable and safe housing total dwellings % 1.4.2 ECONOMY shelter Percentage of people living in an overcrowded dwelling, as defined by the number of rooms available to the household, the household’s size, as well Housing quality Overcrowding rate as its members’ ages and family situation % 11.1 Percentage of the population in poor Share of population unable to keep home housing conditions adequately warm by risk of poverty % 11.1 Average age of the housing stock in years Average age of the housing stock in years years 11.1 68 The indicator measures total national emissions of the so called ‘Kyoto basket’ of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), and the so-called F-gases (hydrofluorocarbons, perfluorocarbons, nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6)). Using each gas’ individual global warming potential (GWP), they are being integrated into a single indicator expressed in units of CO2 Units of equivalents. Emissions data are submitted CO2 annually by the EU Member States as part equival of the reporting under the United Nations ents Greenhouse gas Framework Convention on Climate per Air quality emissions per capita Change (UNFCCC). capita 11.6 Number of days that air quality exceeds Livability WHO recommendation; Urban population exposed to air pollutant concentrations above selected limit and target values EU Criteria: - Population exposed to annual PM2.5 Exceedance of air concentrations above 10 µg/m3. quality standards in - Population exposed to annual PM10 urban areas; Urban concentrations above 20 µg/m3. population exposed - Population exposed to maximum daily 8- to air pollutant hour mean O3 concentrations exceeding # days; concentrations 100 µg/m3 for at least one day a year. % of above WHO air - Population exposed to annual NO2 populat quality guidelines concentrations above 40 µg/m3. ion 11.6 Noise Registered noise Annual data about the number of points levels by town and of noise registration and measured noise Decibel district levels in decibels s 11.6 69 Intentional homicides per 100,000 inhabitants recorded by the police. Homicide is defined as intentional killing Safety of a person, including murder, manslaughter, euthanasia and infanticide. Causing death by dangerous driving is # of excluded, as are abortion and help with homicid suicide. Attempted (uncompleted) es per homicide is also excluded. The counting 100,000 unit for homicide is normally the victim inhabit Homicide rate (rather than the case). ants 16 Percentage of people who declared they had faced the problem of crime, violence Crime or vandalism in the local area % 16.1 Distribution of cultural facilities (per Access to cultural (museums, heritage sites, cinemas, 100,000 facilities theaters) through spatial mapping. pop) 11.4 Total expenditure (public and private) per capita spent on the preservation, protection and conservation of all cultural and natural heritage; » Disaggregated by: • Type of heritage (cultural, natural, Culture mixed, World Heritage Centre designation), • Level of government (national, regional, and Expenditure on local/municipal) preservation, • Type of expenditure (operating protection and expenditure/investment) conservation of • Type of private funding (donations in euros cultural and natural kind, private nonprofit sector, per heritage sponsorship). capita 11.4 70 Access to a # physician /100,00 No. of physicians per 100,000 pop. 0 3 Health Percentage of people declaring having experienced unmet medical needs Unmet need for because of affordability, efficiency (long medical examination waiting lists), accessibility or trust/quality and care (not knowing a good doctor) % 3 Proportion of urban solid waste regularly Collection and collected and with adequate final Cleanliness treatment of urban discharge out of total urban solid waste solid waste generated % 11.6.1 % of individuals who somewhat agree or Citizen perception of strongly agree with the statement: "In this noise pollution city, noise is a big problem" % 11 Citizen perception of % of individuals answering I feel safe city safety walking alone at night in my city (% agree) % 11 % of individuals answering I feel safe Citizen perception of walking alone at night in my neighborhood safety neighborhood (% agree) % 11 Citizen perceptions % of individuals responding that they are Satisfaction with satisfied with healthcare services (% healthcare services agree) % 4 Satisfaction with the cleanliness in the city Satisfaction with the cleanliness in the city % 11.6 Satisfaction with Satisfaction with cultural facilities (% of cultural facilities survey respondents) % 11.4 71 Employment generated and labor market Labor force participation rate Labor force participation rate % 8 Employment rate Employment rate % 8.5.2 Employment rate associated to newly Employment rate associated to newly created firms created firms % 9.2.2 New business (#/100. registered New business registered 000) 9 Growth Number of # per businesses per inhabit capita Number of businesses per capita ants 9 Job-Friendly Labor force Percentage of the population aged 25-64 who have successfully completed tertiary Tertiary education studies (e.g. university, higher technical rate institution, etc.) % 4 Expenditure on Intramural R&D expenditures are all research and expenditures for R&D performed within a development (R & statistical unit or sector of the economy Innovation and FDI D) during a specific period as share of GDP % 9 Foreign direct investment in non- Foreign direct investment in non-financial financial enterprises enterprises EUR 9 Net firm creation rate Firm birth rate minus firm death rate % 9 72 Gender Female labor force participation rate Female labor force participation rate % 8, 10 Young people neither in employment nor in Youth education and Young people neither in employment nor training (NEET) rate in education and training (NEET) rate % 8.6.1 Employment rates of young people not Employment rates of young people aged in education and from 15 to 34 years not in education or training training % 8.6.1 Age dependency ratio is the ratio of dependents--people younger than 15 or Aging Population older than 64--to the working-age dependency ratio population--those ages 15-64. % 1, 8 Public buildings Access & Inclusion adapted to % of accommodate public individuals with Public buildings adapted to accommodate building disabilities individuals with disabilities s 11.2 Disabilities Share of the built-up area of cities that is open space for public use for all, by Average share of the built-up area of cities % of sex, age and persons that is open space for public use for all, by built up 11.2, with disabilities sex, age and persons with disabilities areas 11.7.2 Percentage of people who are at risk of People at risk of poverty or severely materially deprived or poverty or social living in households with very low work Poverty/inclusion exclusion intensity % 1 Percentage of people who declared to be People in work at- at work (employed or self-employed) who risk-of-poverty are at-risk-of-poverty= % 1 Inequality Inequality of income distribution S80/S20 income quintile share ratio % 10 73 Disposable income Disposable income of private households of private relative to national average . The balance PPS per households relative of primary income and redistribution of inhabit to national average income in cash per national average ant 10 For racial and ethnic Alternative: Proportion of the public minorities: a good reporting that they are affected by Ethnic minorities place to live (Urban discrimination due to skin color or Perceptions Survey) discrimination as immigrants % 10 For gay or lesbian people: a good place Alternative: Percentage of LGBTI people LGBTQ to live (Urban who report experiencing employment Perceptions Survey) discrimination in the last 12 months % 10 tons Total CO2 emissions, in metric tons per per CO2 emissions capita capita 11.6 annual daily mean or PM2.5, PM 10, SO, Composite score for GHG emissions microgr NO (PM2.5, PM 10, SO, NO) /m3 11.6.2 Population weighted average of a 10 by 10 km of air Ozone O3 concentration Greenhouse gas (μg/m3) interpolated on a grid created by ENVIRONMENT Decarbonization emissions Ozone the EEA. μg/m3 11.6.2 Population weighted average of a 10 by 10 km of air concentration (μg/m3) of particle matter of size 2.5 micrometers (small particles) interpolated on a grid created by the EEA. Capped to 25 μg/m3 = Air pollution – pm limit yearly value of the EU Ambient Air 2.5 Quality Directive μg/m3 11.6.2 Population weighted average of a 10 by 10 km of air concentration (μg/m3) of particle matter of size 10 micrometers (big Air pollution – pm particles) interpolated on a grid created 10 by the EEA μg/m3 11.6.2 74 Population weighted average of annual average concentration of NO2 in μg/m³, interpolated at 1 km² grid cell level and combined with GEOSTAT 1 km² grid population data, set by the EU Ambient Air pollution - NO2 Air Quality Directive. μg/m3 11.6.2 Renewable energy consumption as a Renewable energy percentage of total final energy consumption consumption. % 7.2.1 Share of renewable energy carriers in final energy consumption for space heating, cooling, and water heating in the residential building sector excluding Renewable energy electricity of total energy consumption for Energy mix in the heating and space heating, cooling, and water in cooling of buildings building % 7.2.1 Renewable energy Renewable energy sources in electricity in electricity (% of total electric energy consumption) % 7.2.1 Renewable energy in transport Renewable energy sources in transport % 7.2.1 Use of non-car transport (The total % of Non-motorized the working population traveling to work transport Use of non-car on public transport, by bicycle and by transport foot) % 11.6 Electrified public Electric vehicles as a proportion of the Public transport transport total fleet % 11.2 Land consumption Spatial form to population Ratio of land consumption rate to 11.A; growth population growth rate % 11.3.1 energy Construction of Energy consumption Total final energy consumption in the consum buildings of residential residential sector per square meter of ption buildings residential floor space per m2 11 District heating Energy losses from (optional) the district heating Energy losses from the district heating system system *TBD 7.1 75 Urban population exposed to hazards Hazard vulnerability (seismic, urban flooding, heat) % 11.5 Population affected by natural disasters: Exposure Number of deaths, missing persons and Disaster Resilience directly affected persons attributed to # of Disaster exposure disasters per 100,000 population deaths 11.B. # of Number of high-scale disasters occurring disaster Disaster frequency in the past 100 years s 11.5; 13.1 Disaster impact projection Projected GDP impact of disaster EUR 11.5.2 Cooling and heating Cooling and heating degree days need to Urban Heat Impact degree days maintain an average of 15.5C in buildings days 13 Waste collected and treated by or for municipalities. It covers waste from households, including bulky waste, similar Waste waste from commerce and trade, office measur buildings, institutions and small ed by businesses, as well as yard and garden cubic waste, street sweepings, the contents of meters Municipal waste litter containers, and market cleansing per generated waste if managed as household waste. capita 11.6 Solid waste Circularity Municipal waste disposed in a sanitary Landfill rate landfill (% of total waste generated) % 12 Recycling rate of municipal households (% of total household municipal waste Local recycling rate generated) % 12.5.1 Composting rate of municipal organic Compost rate as a percentage of total waste of households household municipal waste generated % 12.2.2 Innovation Circular material use Circular material use rate as % of total rate material use % 12.2.1 76 hectare Green spaces per Hectares of green space available per s/100.0 capita inhabitant 00 cap 11.7; 15 Distribution of green Distance to urban green areas measured minute 11.3; Green space urban areas in minutes of walking s 11.7; 15 Biodiversity & Public satisfaction Public satisfaction with green spaces such 11.3; Greening with green spaces as public parcs or gardens: % satisfied % 11.7; 15 Public outdoor recreation space= Public outdoor recreation space per capita m2/cap 11.7; 15 Total wastewater discharged into water Ecosystem Impact Untreated body without treatment (% of total water wastewater discharged) % 6.2 Percentage of urban wastewater with Urban wastewater more stringent treatment in collected treatment wastewater % 6.3.1 Water & waste Access to adequate water and safe drinking Share of people who declared being water satisfied with water quality % 6 % of Water losses Water loss as % of net water production m3 6.4.1 Electricity Electricity Proportion of population with access to connection electricity % 7.1.1 Proportion of the population that has SYSTEM convenient access to public transport. Access to public transport is considered convenient when a stop is accessible within a walking distance along the street Public transport network of 500 m from a reference point availability such as a home, school, work place, Access to public market, etc. to a low-capacity public transport, by sex, transport system (e.g. bus, Bus Rapid 11.2.1; age and persons Transit) and/or 1 km to a high-capacity 11.3.1; with disabilities system (e.g. rail, metro, ferry). % 11.7.1 Solid waste Population with regular solid waste Solid waste collection collection (% of total population) % 12 District heating District heating Households connected to the district (optional) connection rate heating system (% of total households) % 7.1.1 77 District heating losses Heat losses in district heating systems *TBD 7.3 Disconnect rate of district heating systems Disconnect rate of district heating systems % 7.1 Own-source Own-source revenue as a % of total revenue rate revenues % 16 Surplus or deficit accruing from production before taking account of any Fiscal autonomy and interest, rent or similar charges payable performance on financial or tangible non-produced assets borrowed or rented by the Financially Sound enterprise, or any interest, rent or similar receipts receivable on financial or tangible non-produced assets owned by the Operating surplus enterprise. ratio 16 Cash to current Cash (end of year)/current liabilities liabilities ratio (divided by 365 days) ratio 16 Capital investment Capital spending as a % of total effort Capital spending expenditures % 16 Creditworthiness Credit ratings Credit ratings by agencies % 16 Local election Percentage of people participating in local Voter turnout participation elections % 11.3.2 Households that have internet access at Internet access Internet access home % 17.6.1 Information on % of all public authorities’ Individuals obtaining information from individu Smart & web sites public authorities web sites als 16.7.1a Participatory Smart service Online interaction % of all delivery / e- with public Individuals using the internet for individu government authorities interacting with public authorities als 16.7.1a availability Online accessibility Information and services of my local % of all of information and public administration can be easily individu services accessed online: agree als 16.7.1a 78 % of all Usage of e- Online submission Individuals using the internet for individu government services of completed forms submitting completed forms als 16.7.1a Properties registered in the Properties registered in the cadaster Spatial cadaster system/database as a percentage of total system/database properties % 11.A. Ratio of land consumption rate to population growth rate. This indicator Land use Land consumption requires defining the two components of to population population growth and land consumption growth rate. % 11.2. Equipment rate for public transport # per vehicles captures the number of motor 1000 Public transport coaches, buses and trolleybuses per 1000 inhabit vehicles inhabitants ants 11.3. Well-Planned Percentage of roads modernized as a Transport Road modernization share of built roads % 11.B. Percentage of peak-period vehicle or Road traffic person travel that occurs under congested congestion conditions % 11.3.1 minute Commute time Average commute trip time s 11.3.1 Ease of obtaining Average days to issue a construction construction permit permit days 11.A.1 Governance Performance in good governance Percentage of people having low trust in index the legal system % 16 79 Annex 2: Qualitative Component of the Sustainable Cities Framework Questionnaire to be completed for the qualitative component of the Sustainable Cities Implementation Framework 1. AFFORDABLE AND SAFE SHELTER 1. Do the current building regulations reflect energy efficiency and resilience Y/N considerations covering natural hazards (e.g. earthquake, water, landslides)? 2. If the building stock is aging: a. Is there a strategy in place for their management or renovation? Y/N b. Are there programs to support the strategy? Y/N 2. LIVABILITY 1. Is there active air quality monitoring taking place? Y/N 2. Is there any information on perceptions of safety and especially where these correlate Free response – with the state of the physical environment - opportunity for Crime Prevention transformed Through Environmental Design (CPTED)? into yes/no 3. Is cultural and religious heritage vulnerable to the consequences of climate change, Y/N natural disasters and deterioration due to lack of maintenance? 4. Does the city have a disease surveillance system that monitors changes in health risks, Y/N including climate-sensitive risks? 5. Can the surveillance system provide early warnings about potential health disasters? Y/N 3. JOB-FRIENDLY 1. Does the economic region have in place an infrastructure system that promotes Y/N economic growth? 2. Does the city have a local economic development strategy? Y/N a. If yes, are there programs actively being implemented under the strategy? Y/N 3. Are there local business licensing requirements? Y/N a. If there are local business licensing requirements, rate the ease of obtaining a 5-Jan business permit in the city: (1-5) 4. Are vocational training institutes linked to local industries? Y/N 4. ACCESS & INCLUSION 80 1. Does the current urban planning system encourage the design of inclusive urban 1-5 space? (youth, aging, disabilities) 2. Are all residents able to use and benefit from the city’s natural resources, ecosystem 1-5 services, and recreation areas? 3. Does the city have programs for improving accessibility and knowledge about Y/N effective use of ecosystem services for all segments of the population? 4. Does the city have the capacity to adjust and/or increase the provision of basic services in line with rapid changes in the population, resulting from rural to urban 1-5 migration, influx of refugees, etc.? 5. Percentage of municipal budget allocated for the provision of mobility aids, devices % and assistive technologies to citizens with special needs 6. Does the current urban planning system encourage the design of inclusive urban 1-5 space? (youth, aging, disabilities) 5. DECARBONIZATION 1. Does the city have a climate change action plan? Y/N a. If yes, have climate considerations been formally mainstreamed into relevant Y/N city departments? b. If yes, are there systems for evaluation and accountability? Y/N c. If yes, has the city set a carbon baseline? Y/N 2. Does the city regularly assess and monitor land consumption rates? Y/N 3. Does the city staff participate in regular training and knowledge-sharing events about Y/N environmental challenges, and how these relate to climate change? 4. Are there environmental licensing requirements for new developments? Y/N a. If yes, do land use plans indicate where development is permissible and Y/N where it would be damaging for the environment? b. Are land use plans enforced? Y/N c. Does the city conduct any environmental enforcement (e.g., during the Y/N construction process)? 5. Is the city actively pursuing pedestrianization and encouraging non-motorized Y/N transport? 6. Does the city have feed-in tariffs for solar energy production? Y/N 81 6. DISASTER RESILIENCE 1. Risk identification: Is there a city-level risk assessment? Y/N a. Risk reduction: Does the city have a climate resilience/adaptation plan? Y/N b. Risk reduction: If yes, are there proactive city-level investments to reduce Y/N risks (programs to retrofit, better flood mitigation, heat plan)? 2. Preparedness: Do early warning systems exist? Y/N a. If so, are they connected to national systems? Y/N 3. Financial protection and resilient reconstruction: Do the city and the state have Y/N sufficient disaster response capacity to provide finance for relief and reconstruction? 4. Does the city have a preventative maintenance for stormwater systems to reduce Y/N urban flooding? 7. CIRCULARITY 1. Does the current capacity of the waste system meet existing and projected demand? Y/N a. What is the rate of door-to-door collection of waste? % b. Are there measures to support separation of waste at source? Y/N 2. Does the city have a waste reduction strategy and implementation system? Y/N a. If yes, does the city monitor and gather data on the performance of the Y/N recycling? b. IF yes, does the city promote waste reduction at the household and industry level by means of formal education, community training/awareness raising Y/N campaigns and government incentives? c. Does the city promote incentives for diversion and/ or productive use of Y/N waste (ie. composting, anaerobic digestion) in addition to waste reduction? 3. Are there any active programs to link manufacturing waste producers with other possible manufacturers (i.e. linking waste by-products as inputs for other Y/N manufacturers)? 8. BIODIVERSITY & GREENING 82 1. Does the city have data or information on the location of critical biodiversity areas Y/N with and around the city? 2. Do urban plans and local development policies incorporate biodiversity and Y/N environment considerations? a. If yes, are there specific funds allocation to greening and biodiversity? Y/N 3. Is green infrastructure considered an option in investment programs? Y/N 4. Does the city monitor/assess the quantity and quality of its green spaces? Y/N 9. BASIC SERVICES 1. Does the city have an overview of all water, sanitation and drainage infrastructure in the city, including capacity levels, design specifics, number and location of key Y/N facilities? 2. Is planning for disasters, shocks, or stresses incorporated into the regular water, Y/N sanitation, and drainage infrastructure planning process? 3. Are there specific budget allocations for the operations and maintenance of critical infrastructure (i.e., primary transport linkages, water mains and pumping stations, Y/N power generation, etc)? a. Are there scheduled and structured long-term maintenance plans for key Y/N infrastructure? 4. Does the city have a cost-recovery baseline and plan per service? Y/N 5. Are all areas of the city and socio-economic segments of the population covered by Y/N the (water, waste management, transport) system in an equitable manner? a. Is it financially accessible for all groups? Y/N 10. FINANCIALLY SOUND 1. Does the city have an operating surplus? Y/N 2. Revenue control/collection performance: is the city collecting own source revenues Y/N fully? 3. Does the city have a multi-year capital investment plan? Y/N a. How much of the capital investment plan is funded? % 83 4. Transfers: Are central fiscal transfers predictable and transparent (in terms of timing, Y/N amount, and allocation formula)? a. Are fiscal transfers sufficient to fund delegated functions by the central Y/N government (e.g. paying for teacher’s salaries)? b. Are the fiscal transfers equalizing across different cities? Y/N c. Is the current allocation formula incentivizing greater local revenue Y/N collection? 5. Borrowing: Do cities keep records of municipal arrears and contractual debt? Y/N a. If yes, what is the percentage of this liability to annual operating revenues? % 6. Does the city have its own in-house capacity to perform general financial Y/N management using relevant digital tools? 11. SMART & PARTICIPATORY 1. Does the city engage in a participatory strategic planning and budgeting process? Y/N a. Is the city actively promoting the mobilization of citizens to participate in Y/N planning processes? b. Does the usual engagement approach ensure equitable representation? Y/N 2. Does the city publish its plans and budgets on a public website? Y/N 3. Does the city have a mechanism in place for continuous citizen feedback and Y/N complaints? 4. Does the city have transparent and predictable procedures for public/stakeholder Y/N participation during planning processes? 5. Does the city have any structured platforms or forums for engagement with specific Y/N sector groups (i.e. private sector, tourism, NGOs?) 6. Does the city proactively and on an annual basis invest in computing infrastructure Y/N (hardware and software)? 7. Does the city have digital infrastructure in place to track the performance of service Y/N delivery systems (e.g. complaints-logging to track water losses)? 12. WELL-PLANNED 84 1. Does the city have a strategic plan to guide its future development? Is urban Y/N planning/future development guided by a city strategy? a. If yes, is this plan evidence-based (i.e. taking into account population growth, Y/N demographics, protected areas, climate change)? b. If yes, is the plan aligned with the spatial development framework or spatially Y/N informed? c. Does the city strategy encourage the principles of good neighborhood- Y/N making (i.e. mixed land-use, high density, active mobility)? 2. Does the city have access to or generate its own data on the built environment, and Y/N natural and man-made threats to the city? a. Does the city use inter-operable digital tools (i.e. enterprise-wide GIS Y/N systems) in planning, operations and monitoring? b. Is this data actively used to inform policy on an ongoing basis? Y/N 3. Are there systems in place to ensure alignment between the city’s budget with Y/N municipal development plans or articulated priorities? a. Is there a process to prioritize capital investments? Y/N b. Does the city consider the affordability of life-cycle Operations and Maintenance costs of capital investment items before including them in the Y/N CIP? 4. Is transportation planning integrated with strategic and other urban development plans, economic development plans, environment management plans and/or climate Y/N change strategies and plans? a. Does the city monitor and gather data on transport system performance? Y/N b. Does the city have adequate data/tools/methods for monitoring Y/N performance? 85 c. Does the city have data on transport modal split (tram, bus, metro, bicycles, Y/N passenger vehicles)? 5. Does the city have information regarding the utilization and general up-keep of Y/N private property assets? a. Is there a program to increase the proportion of properties that are Y/N registered and digitized? 6. Does the city have an inventory of publicly owned land, buildings, and infrastructure? Y/N a. If so, is the inventory regularly updated? Y/N 7. Does the city participate or contribute to planning activities outside its immediate Y/N administrative boundaries? 86 Annex 3: Data notes for dashboard completion in this application It should be noted that for the European Union and EUROSTAT, the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS) has been established (Eurostat, 2020). The NUTS code is composed by two initial letters which define the country, and one, two, or three numbers according to the geographical unit they correspond to. The NUTS classification provides the advantage comparability among data of the same level in different countries. For example, even if in Bulgaria the smallest territorial unit are provinces while in Poland are subregions, they are comparable because they are identified by the same NUTS code level, which is the NUTS 3 level. A more detailed of description of NUTS classifications are as follows: • NUTS 1 reports two letters and one number and identifies the macro-regional or regional level. For example, in Bulgaria, NUTS 1 level coincides with regions, Croatia has no NUTS1 level, in Poland and Romania NUTS 1 corresponds to macro-regions; • NUTS 2 is composed by two letters and two numbers, and identifies states or regions. In Bulgaria NUTS 2 level stands for planning regions, in Croatia and Romania are regions, while in the NUTS 2 units of Poland are Voivodeships (which correspond to provinces); • NUTS 3 is the smallest unit of analysis before the municipality level. The code is composed of two letters and three numbers. The NUTS 3 level in Bulgaria identifies the Oblasts (Bulgarian provinces), in Croatia and Romania are counties, while in Poland these are subregions. Data were sourced from publicly available and internationally recognized sources, such as EUROSTAT, the World Bank, the European Environmental Agency (EEA), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), the United Nations (UN), and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). All these data are publicly available and free for download from each institutional website. The websites used for the data collection are: • EUROSTAT: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/main/data/database • The World Bank: https://databank.worldbank.org/home.aspx • European Environmental Agency: https://www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps • United Nations: https://data.un.org/ • United Nation Development Programme: http://hdr.undp.org/en/data Initially, the two main years selected for the analysis were 2015 and 2018. This strategy had been applied because some data for 2018 are still provisional or incomplete, so it was preferable to have a five year-lag data to mitigate for possible missing observations. For some other data, there were no recent observations, sometimes because the variables were part of a survey (like the Census data in 2011) sometimes because they are part of specific projects, like the Statistics on Income and Living Conditions – SILC, where publicly available data is no longer reported after 2013. A second round of data collection, to supplement these initial sources, captured data from national statistics sources and more recent initiatives, such as the ESPON SDG localizing tool. In this case, a more flexible approach to the timeframe was taken, using the most recent years for the data from the available sources and noting discrepancies or missing data in the corresponding codebook of each country file. 87 Annex 4: Country level findings: Summary tables Summary of Bulgarian City Sustainability Findings URBAN SYSTEMS Key findings Planning • At the city level, efforts are being made for better integrated planning, however disconnected and outdated plans continue to be challenges. • The 2021-2027 EU programming makes improvements to foster integrated planning, however previous experience points to local capacity challenges which need to be addressed. • New requirements for regional coordination also necessitate training and capacity building as well as interjurisdictional cooperation to implement more joint investment projects. • EU programs support local administrative capacity building, however further support is needed. • The bigger cities in Bulgaria are characterized by suburbanization and construction on greenfield sites, which causes a strain for municipalities to provide services and increases the carbon footprint. • Urban areas continue to expand at the expense of agricultural lands despite distinct population decline, further threatening city sustainability. • A significant part of the country is covered by cadastral maps; however, challenges exist with keeping property registries updated. • A challenge to sustainable spatial development of Bulgarian cities has to do with underutilized government-owned properties and the lack of incentives for both investors and local governments to repurpose them. • The lack of a complete, up-to-date, and unified information system for the development of cities and different types of zones and properties is among the main obstacles to perform a comprehensive analysis of the challenges facing Bulgarian cities and subsequently to formulate a strategy for their development. Municipal • Bulgaria is one of the EU countries with the lowest percentage of local government finance expenditure to GDP while at the same time cities heavily rely on central government transfers to support city services. • In terms of local government expenditures, the programs financed by EU funds and co- financed by the national budget are the fundamental source of financing for municipalities both in terms of capital investment and operation and maintenance for municipal service delivery. • Financial sustainability is of concern for growing and shrinking cities, as both the local own- source revenue assignment and its performance (from local taxes and fees) are constrained, making it challenging for cities to pay for services and infrastructure investments. • While all municipalities can borrow from the financial market subject to adhering to municipal borrowing regulations, few have a credit rating, and 27 municipalities were under a financial recovery process in 2019. Basic services • Water losses within Bulgaria’s water system remain high while the provision of wastewater connections to households and supporting treatment capacity continue to lag. • Significant resources have been invested in improving municipal waste collection and treatment (recovery and disposal) facilities, with recycling rates are steadily increasing but landfilling rates remain high. • Integrated urban transport has been a focus of massive investments in recent years however the quality of newly built infrastructure and the efficiency of automated ticketing systems have been questioned. 88 Smart & While there is citizen participation in local affairs, more genuine community engagement is Participatory necessary to ensure that sustainability-focused investments sufficiently address local needs. PEOPLE AND ECONOMY Key findings Housing • Housing affordability and a weak rental market pose as major economic hurdles for middle to low-income Bulgarian city dwellers. • In addition, poor quality of multi-family apartment buildings, due to the deferred maintenance, threatens the safety and quality of life for their residents. • Public assistance for the poor and marginalized to access affordable housing is limited to municipally built social housing units, and they are not meeting the demand from the marginalized and poor. • Given the challenges in the housing market, it is of utmost importance that the comprehensive approach (tackling both supply and demand side issues for housing sector) laid out in Draft National Housing Strategy to be adopted and implemented. Livability • Bulgaria ranks last in EU in terms of citizens' satisfaction with the quality of life. • Healthcare, education and childcare access and outcomes are generally better in urban than rural areas, however challenges remain. • The overall quality of green spaces in cities is poor, due to lack of maintenance. • A significant share of public infrastructure investments in cities is directed towards improving the public realm, but poor construction in many cases has not led to improved livability. • The country ranks as the fourth worst in Europe in terms of air quality and air quality satisfaction in Bulgarian cities is amongst the lowest in the EU. Job-friendly • Bulgarian cities play a fundamental role as engines of economic growth, however a major (economy) challenge for fostering sustainable urban economies is the demographic crisis affecting even the bigger growth centers. • The poor quality of the transport infrastructure in some regions is another factor for uneven economic development between the cities. • The Sub-national Doing Business report for Bulgaria, Hungary, and Romania points to significant opportunities for improving the business environment even just by adopting best practices from within the country. • Sound spatial planning and construction of modern industrial zones will be critical for sustainable economic growth. • While the Covid19 pandemic did not impact the Bulgarian economy as dramatically compared to other EU countries, it revealed improvements necessary to support a more sustainable economy, both at the national and sub-national level. Access and • in the urban centers there is a shortage of sites and capacity to address the needs of the Inclusion growing aging population. • the agenda for Roma inclusion is advancing relatively slowly. • The affordability of preschool and childcare services is emerging as a significant financial burden for marginalized groups of the population and became more pronounced during the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic. 89 ENVIRONMENT Key findings Carbon • 44 cities have voluntarily signed onto the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy: of neutrality these, 25 have submitted action plans and 5 have reported progress. • Bulgaria has successfully decoupled growth from greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions but needs to further decarbonize in line with the EU-27 targets on climate, renewable energy, and energy efficiency. Disaster • Bulgaria is highly exposed to natural hazards, making disaster resilience a national resilience priority. • The country is taking a proactive approach to manage disaster risks, however municipalities face capacity constraints. Circularity • Bulgaria’s circularity rate has improved from 2.1% in 2010 to 5.1% in 2017 but it still lags behind the EU average of 11.2% and falls within the lowest ten ranks. Biodiversity/ • Bulgarian cities have been losing their green spaces due to development pressures, and greening while law requires them to ensure the construction and protection of their green system, the number of cities that actually do is unknown. 90 Summary of Croatian City Sustainability Findings URBAN SYSTEMS Key findings Planning • Croatia’s spatial planning system follows a hierarchal framework, from the national to the local level, however the system suffers from fragmentation and a lack of coordination and resources to implement the various plans. • A recent law aims to move from fragmented planning, both horizontally, between sectors, and vertically, between different levels of governments. However, it poses a challenge to government administrations that already have capacity constraints. • While Croatia has absorbed most of its allocated EU funds for 2014-2020, the effectiveness of investments towards integrated sustainable development remains to be seen. • For the purpose of accessing EU funds, regional coordination has been successful; however, in the absence of EU funding, continued regional coordination to foster sustainable urban growth is uncertain. • Croatia’s land management system has been largely digitalized and the process to complete the cadaster and land registries is ongoing, however there is a widespread perception of corruption with regards to land development. Municipal finance • Local governments face several challenges with respect to becoming financially sound, the first deals with expenditure assignments and a reliance on central government transfers. • Another challenge to local government financial sustainability is the lack of stability in the central transfer system, which impedes local governments’ ability to do adequate budget planning • Local governments rely heavily on EU funds and national government support to finance capital investments, while tax revenues are limited, and restrictive fiscal rules make borrowing impossible for many cities Basic services • While cities are able to deliver quality drinking water, water losses are significant and wastewater treatment is inadequate. • 99% of Croatia’s population is covered by municipal solid waste collection service, however Croatia is far from reaching its key waste management targets. • Limited district heating accessibility impacts poorer households, with heat losses pointing to investments necessary to improve efficiency. • Croatia has invested heavily in hard transport infrastructure, creating a strong national inter-city road network, but key complements are missing at the local level – these include traffic management and other investments to reduce congestion within and around cities and during peak tourist seasons; and an efficient and integrated public transport system. Smart & • Croatian cities have made some headway with improving transparency by making Participatory documents available to the public, but more steps are necessary to foster smart and participatory governance. • While the majority of the population in cities have internet access and a personal computer, there is an opportunity for Croatian cities to apply “smart� solutions that enable a better quality of life for their citizens and that increase transparency and accountability. 91 PEOPLE AND ECONOMY Key findings Housing • Limited rental housing and a high rate of overcrowding pose as threats to the sustainability and quality of living in Croatian cities. • The lack of affordable housing options has led to unsustainable urban sprawl around the larger cities. • High vacancy rates could reflect the emptying out of city centers, but rates could be overstated due to the problematic black market presence in the country. • A lack of social housing and squatting pose as addition challenges facing Croatian cities. • While there are a few housing programs at the national level to address of the challenges, a systematic approach towards housing is needed. Livability • At the national level, citizens’ satisfaction with the quality of life in Croatia is below the EU average; data availability to assess livability at the city level is limited. • Croatia’s national and city governments have both taken action to improve air quality, however a significant fraction of Croatians in urban areas continue to be exposed to air pollutant concentration levels that are higher than those considered to be safe for human health. • Health-related indicators in Croatian cities are generally good compared to the national average, however improvements to the healthcare system are necessary to meet the needs of the growing aging population. Job-friendly • In Croatia, economic growth has been slow and is driven more at the regional level (economy) than at the city level. • Trade, manufacturing, and public administration are Croatia’s most significant employers across the country’s seven functional urban areas, with a few deviations. • Low labor force participation and high unemployment point to challenges for Croatia’s economic growth, with cities and their surrounding jurisdictions needing to work together on a joint economic growth strategy for the region. • The Zagreb, Rijeka, and Pula functional urban areas play a leading role in growing Croatia’s economy; strengthening institutions and building capacity to provide quality basic services and improved connectivity are key for their sustainability. • Strengthening local productivity will require prioritizing research, development, and innovation. Access and • As is the trend in other European countries, challenges to social sustainability in Inclusion Croatian cities are compounded by a growing aging population and large emigration flows of the youth educated population. • Croatia has made substantive progress on including gender equality both institutionally and legally into its policy agenda, however concerted action is necessary for cities to support closing other gaps. • Today’s youth are the key to a sustainable future for Croatian cities, yet youth with less skills and education remain at the fringes of the labor market • The minority Roma population, living in Zagreb and pockets of poverty across the country, suffer from discrimination and social segregation. • Discrimination and exclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex (LGBTI), and other vulnerable groups remain high in Croatian labor market. • While poverty levels are higher in rural areas than in urban areas (45% compared to 29% in 2013), cities must take action to reduce poverty and include improving the livelihoods of the poor into their development plans. 92 ENVIRONMENT Key findings Carbon neutrality • While achievements have been made in the country to reduce GHG emissions, Croatian cities remain carbon-intensive, largely due to transport and building emissions. • Croatian cities have also pledged their commitment towards climate action; local governments will need to design cities and their region to further reduce carbon emissions. Disaster resilience • Croatia faces a number of environmental risks – with climate vulnerability being the most pressing one; these risks are imposing a cost on Croatia’s economy and lowering the quality of life of Croatians. • Coastal cities, being particularly vulnerable to climate change, need to mitigate potential water service and security risks. • Earthquakes and floods also pose risks to Croatian cities, necessitating development of a disaster risk preparedness and response system. Circularity • Croatia has only recently started the transition from a linear to circular economy; making advances requires policymaking, incentives and tools for local governments as the main change agents. • Investments in R&D, eco-design, and eco-innovation can help cities advance the development of the circular economy. Biodiversity/ • Large cities are characterized with very limited amounts of public green spaces, greening which are important for environmental sustainability and livability. 93 Summary of Poland City Sustainability Findings URBAN SYSTEMS Key findings Planning • The overall planning structure in Poland is quite elaborate and structured in a hierarchical manner, however inefficiencies exist in the planning system. • Current spatial planning policies and practices result in suboptimal and unsustainable urban development. • A loophole in the planning system allows for housing to be built without following the city’s plan for the area. • Creating local plans is a long and costly process, which smaller cities may not have the resources to develop and implement effectively. • Requirements are lacking for the development of regional plans, which hinders sustainable urban development at the metropolitan level. • Improvement in overall urban planning practices and capacity would be required to enable more effective management of both the day-to-day planning tasks as well as more forward-looking and strategic spatial planning and development. • Sprawling urban development patterns have taken shape due to improper market projections and a weak regulatory environment. • Poland has a highly developed cadaster, though additional property information can facilitate greater transparency and expedite development. Municipal finance • Sub-national governments have a degree of decentralization of powers and functions; however, they are reliant on central transfers for operations and capital expenditures. • Flaws in Poland’s fiscal equalization system have resulted in the system being cost ly and ineffective in creating fairness and efficiency at the local level; incentives are needed for local governments to improve their economic standing and fiscal capacity rather than relying on central transfers. • Local governments are required to develop multi-year financial forecasts and cities are allowed to borrow, but only in domestic currency, which limits risks and rewards. • 18 Polish cities have an excellent or good credit rating, which reflects well on their financial sustainability. Basic services • Water and wastewater treatment services in Poland are the responsibility of municipalities; while cities have undergone considerable investments to rehabilitate deteriorated infrastructure, reforms to water management and an improved institutional framework are needed. • Solid waste management is handled either at the city or regional level; regional initiatives have experienced challenges. • Energy supply in cities is reliable and power outages are a rare occurrence, however coal-based energy generates air pollution and high carbon emissions. • While major cities are focusing on limiting private vehicular use and public transport systems are well-developed, integrated transportation planning across all transport modes and coordination at the regional level are lacking. • There has been some success with public transport connectivity at the metropolitan level, but success is limited. 94 PEOPLE AND ECONOMY Key findings Housing • Increasing home prices and housing affordability pose as major challenges - particularly in larger cities - which directly influences suburbanization. • Middle- and low-income households have limited options to live in the larger cities as home prices and rents are high and social housing stock is limited. • Nearly 65% of those renting flats live in overcrowded conditions, which has a negative impact on quality of life. • While the country faces a housing deficit, with local governments spending very little of their budget to building affordable housing, the supply of housing is increasing. Livability • While official indicators measuring livability in Polish cities are not readily available, a recent national survey provides insight into quality of life in urban areas. • Of all the livability indicators available regarding Polish cities, air quality is the most concerning. • According to the GUS survey, Polish urbans dwellers are largely satisfied with the level of noise in the city. • Cities can do better with respect to cleanliness of public spaces, especially the largest cities, according to the GUS survey. • Concerns over safety and crime are mixed in Polish cities. • Dissatisfaction in the quality of healthcare provision in cities is high, as healthcare providers and facilities are in extremely short supply. Competitive and • The largest cities and their respective regions have a driving function in the country’s Job-friendly economy, while many mid-size and smaller cities are experiencing socio-economic decline. Access and • Inclusion of youth in Polish cities is evident in terms of urban design. Inclusion • Polish cities seem to be doing well with respect to including the needs of persons with disabilities into designing the city. • In light of a growing aging population, each city has its own elderly inclusion policy, but boosting healthcare services is necessary and requires reform across levels of government. ENVIRONMENT Key findings Carbon neutrality • A heavy reliance on coal leaves Poland among the most carbon-intensive countries in the EU. • Poland’s poor air quality is driven by coal dependence, energy inefficient building systems, and road-based transportation. • At the national level, Poland has taken steps to improve air quality, however Poland is the only country in the EU not to commit to climate neutrality by 2050 according to the Green Deal. • Cities however are pledging their commitment to reduce GHG emissions, with 86 cities having signed onto the Covenant of Mayors, and 105 cities having applied to the national Cities Partnership Initiative. Disaster resilience • Poland's population and economy are exposed to earthquakes and floods, with floods posing the greater risk; disaster preparedness and rapid disaster response are essential. Biodiversity/ • Some Polish cities do very well in terms of public green space provision while others greening do not, presenting these latter cities with a key area to take climate action. 95 Summary of Romania City Sustainability Findings URBAN SYSTEMS Key findings Planning • The development of Romanian cities is guided by a complex planning framework, involving various plans at the regional, county, and local level. • The current planning framework has led to several challenges, a main one being the ineffectiveness of General Urban Plans. • Fragmented plans lacking coordination have resulted in new development taking place without infrastructure being built to support the new development. • The poor availability of data and insufficient institutional capacity to manage data pose challenges to tracking progress and results of the various urban plans. • EU operational programs (particularly the Regional Operational Programme) have had the biggest impact on Romanian cities in terms of planning leading to implementation, however results are mixed, and the long-term sustainability of investments is questionable. • The urban growth pattern in Romania is characterized by the hollowing out of the urban core and urban sprawl; the latter is marked by fragmented dense development in peri-urban areas. • Urban sprawl is evident across the country, with spatial growth pronounced in 16 urban agglomerations. • With new peri-urban development largely permitted on greenfield sites, urban regeneration of brownfield sites remains unattractive to developers. • Unsustainable spatial growth patterns have developed due to an ineffective planning system and a poor-quality cadaster. Financially sound • While some functions are delegated and the sole responsibility of local governments, some functions are shared between county and municipal governments, which can cause confusion and lead to lack of accountability. • Local budgets have historically been dependent on central transfers as a main source of revenue; central transfers are marked by unpredictability, volatility, and limited transparency: this in turn hinders effective budget planning at the local level. • Growing cities have become more fiscally autonomous that shrinking cities. • Despite robust economic growth and increased revenues in recent years, local governments face challenges with becoming financially sustainable due to operational costs that continue to grow and put pressure on the budget. • EU funds play a major role in the development of cities in Romania, however cities have faced challenges with absorbing EU funds. • Overall, the long-term sustainability of capital investments remains weak, as maintenance costs for investments have not been factored into local budgetary planning. • While debt financing forms an integral part of the local government finance system in Romania, only four cities have an international credit rating. Basic services • In Romania, the provision of basic services is commonly by state-owned enterprises (SOEs), which are often characterized by poor service delivery and inefficiencies stemming from weak management. • Romanian cities face challenges with respect to water supply and sanitation (WSS) systems; these include access issues, high water losses, and insufficient wastewater treatment systems. • While WSS services have been shifting to regional operators in the hopes of improving services, interjurisdictional cooperation remains a challenge. 96 • Significant investments have been made to construct regional sanitary landfills, however more investments are necessary to develop integrated solid waste management systems. • SWM service accessibility must be considered for those living in marginalized neighborhoods. • While district heating is considered the most-efficient and potentially the least- polluting solution for dense urban areas, lack of maintenance and investment has led to poor service quality, high costs, declining demand, and carbon emissions. • Poor construction and governance have also contributed to DH service inefficiencies and high costs for both citizens and local governments. • Energy poverty is also an issue that cities must address to improve service provision. • Transport in Romanian cities is heavily car-dependent; traffic congestion is becoming increasingly problematic due to lack of better transport alternatives and insufficient parking infrastructure. • In peri-urban areas, new development designed without integrated transport and urban planning has also led to congestion. • Marginalized areas also suffer from poor quality of public transport services or nonexistence of service. • The European Commission issued the first Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan (SUMP) guidelines in 2013, however plans in Romanian cities have yet to be fully implemented. Smart & • The development of smart cities is in an early stage in Romania; however, progress is Participatory promising. • Participatory governance is a critical practice to foster transparency, accountability, and city sustainability, however across Romanian cities the quality of participatory governance practices varies. PEOPLE AND ECONOMY Key findings Housing • While Romania has the highest percentage of owner-occupied dwellings in the EU at nearly 97%, the country has the highest level of housing deprivation. • The supply of affordable housing in Romanian cities is very limited and is not sufficient to meet demand. • While the poor quality of housing in Romanian cities is reflected by a high level of overcrowding in general, two predominant housing types exhibit poor living conditions: old, Communist-era apartment block buildings and new housing built in peri-urban areas. • A concerted effort at the national, regional, and local level is required to assist cities in addressing housing challenges that impact the entire metropolitan region. Livability • Poor air quality is a growing challenge in many Romanian cities, with significant negative health impacts; this requires urgent attention and commitments to significant shifts in energy production activities and transport modalities towards lower emission options. • Cities struggle with maintaining and improving the quality of public space, with only 66% of the urban population satisfied with public spaces. • Healthcare services are severely lacking in peri-urban areas, which lowers the quality of living in these new areas. • In Romanian cities, cultural heritage buildings and historical monuments tend to be especially vulnerable to earthquakes due to their age while restoration and revitalization efforts are not generally prioritized. 97 Job-friendly • Romania is one of the fastest growing economies in the EU, with metropolitan regions driving growth. • In light of a shrinking workforce, broader labor force participation and adequate skills are needed to sustain regional economic growth. Access and • In the face of changing demographics, Romanian cities have yet to adapt to address Inclusion the needs of a growing aging population; this is especially critical for shrinking cities where the demographic shift is more pronounced. • Almost every city in Romania has pockets of poverty and deprivation, which local governments must address as part of their integrated development plans. ENVIRONMENT Key findings Carbon neutrality • Romanian cities are big contributors, as well as highly vulnerable, to the effects of climate change. • Romanian cities have pledged to take climate action, with 182 cities having signed onto the Covenant of Mayors, however significant shifts to climate smart investments have yet to be seen. • At the national level, Romania has sought to reduce carbon emissions by developing programs to retrofit buildings to make them energy-efficient; while widely implemented at the local level, work is ongoing and program modifications can be made to improve results. • Romanian cities can make further gains in reducing their carbon footprint by developing and implementing spatial plans that effectively drive urban regeneration and compact development. Disaster resilience • Romanian cities are highly vulnerable to several risks, among which earthquakes and floods have resulted in significant physical, social, and financial impacts. • While Romanian governments have taken measures to mitigate seismic risks, progress has been slow and comprehensive disaster preparedness and response systems are needed for cities to improve their resiliency. • The increase in intensity and frequency of heat waves pose another risk for Romanian cities, with changes in land use and a lack of green space serving as major contributors to the urban heat island effect. Biodiversity/ • Cities face administrative obstacles to improving biodiversity protection and greening developing sufficient green space. • Beyond the quantity of green spaces, Romanian cities are starting to address the quality of green spaces for their contribution to social sustainability. Circularity • While the recycling rate in Romania is stagnating at the national level, interjurisdictional cooperation and broad local government participation are necessary to support the transition to a more circular economy, with the Bucharest- Ilfov region playing a major role. 98