Dedicated municipal budget for green spaces - Nantes

The City of Nantes has dedicated over 5% of its total budget to green space in 2010 as part of its re-naturing policies. Within this strategy and utilizing the dedicated budget - which is twice as much as for the city's municipal security department - Nantes aims to promote equal access to green space throughout the entire municipality. As a result, Nantes has managed to double its surface of green spaces since 1999.

Overview

Type of instrument:

Economic and fiscal instruments›Financing mechanisms /market-based instruments (e.g. taxes to generate revenue)

Challenges addressed

Green space management (e.g. accessibility)

Consideration of nature-based solutions:

The city aims to promote equal access to green space throughout the entire municipality. As a result, Nantes has managed to double its surface of green spaces over the last 20 years. Nantes currently has 100 municipal parks, translating into 57 m2 of green space per capita and makes it possible that 100 percent of Nantes’s residents live within 300 meters of a green space (as of 2021).

Targeted (peri-)urban areas:

Parks and (semi)natural urban green areas

Urban green space connected to grey infrastructure

Good practice characteristics:

Effective

Sustainable in the long-term

Locally appropriate

Potential to be replicated / upscaled

Governance

Government body/bodies

Initiating body:

Nantes Métropole

Instrument implementation:

Type of involvement:

The Service for Green Spaces and the Environment (SEVE, service des espaces verts et de l’environnement) is implementing the maintenance of green spaces in Nantes.

Targeted actors:

Citizens or community groups (CBOs), NGOs

Financing

Sources of funding:

Public local authority’s budget

Budget:

1 000 000€ - 5 000 000€

Details about instrument financing:

While overall figures were not able to be found, the budgets for certain years can provide an indication. The City of Nantes has a sizable budget for green spaces, with investment of €4.2 million in 2010 (3.89 percent of the total budget; €14.48 per resident) and running funds totaling €20.3 million (5.28 percent of the municipal budget; €70 per resident with a population of 290,000). To the foregoing, one must also include the investments made by public management in urban development. They have totaled €6 million yearly between , bringing the investment effort to 9.45 percent. These managers, who are also in charge of other public amenities in the city's several eco-neighborhoods, systematically plan and maintain the city's green space framework. In 2016, Nantes invested over €16 million into green spaces and urban greening. The city spends an average of €135 per year per inhabitant on the maintenance and development of its green spaces, which is three times more than the national average (€46.50). The expenses for 2021 indicate at total of €15,830 spent on green urban space investments and €165,000.00 spent on green spaces maintenance, amounting to a total of €180,830.

Monitoring, evaluation and impacts

Achieved outcomes and impacts:

Nantes managed to double its surface of green spaces since the city's initial greening objectives were set in the late 1980s. The city currently has 100 municipal parks, translating into 57m2 of green space per capita. The proportion of people residing within 300 meters of a green area had already reached 100% by 1999, and it has been constant since then.

Success factors and lessons learned:

Political support since the 1980s was instrumental to the establishment and the sustainability of the financial mechanism and the dedication of the municipal budget to the development of green spaces. The municipal budget is renewed every few years, which has implications for how long-term the greening strategy will run. In Nantes, the socialist party (parti socialiste) is in power since the late 80s. The dedicated budget supports a greening strategy, which gives the strategy more power and ability to be successful, as opposed to a strategy that does not have sufficient financing allocated to it in the long term. The dedicated budget for maintenance activities is another good practice, as many times budget is only dedicated to implementation. Maintenance is needed to ensure the continued, long-term delivery of benefits.

Sources and further information

References

List of references:

1. Oscilowicz, E. et al. (2021). Policy and Planning Tools for Urban Green Justice, Fighting displacement and gentrification and improving accessibility and inclusiveness to green amenities. Available at: http://www.bcnuej.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Toolkit-Urban-Green-Justice.pdf. (Accessed: 16 June 2022). 2. European Commission. (2013). A review of 2013, Nantes European Green Capital. Available at: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/europeangreencapital/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/bilan_nantes_green_capital_EN.pdf. (Accessed: 16 June 2022). 3. Nantes Métropole. (2022). Finances Budget Primitif Budget Principal 2022. Available at: https://metropole.nantes.fr/files/pdf/finances%20budget/Budget%20NM%202022/NM%20-%20Budget%20Principal.pdf. (Accessed: 16 June 2022). 4. Nantes Métropole. (2022). Nantes Ville Verte. Available at: https://metropole.nantes.fr/territoire-institutions/projet/ambitions-territoire/nantes-ville-verte. (Accessed: 16 June 2022). 5.Nantes Métropole. (2013). Les principes généraux d'aménagement. Available at: https://metropole.nantes.fr/files/pdf/espace-public/principes-amenagement.pdf. (Accessed: 16 June 2022). 6. European Commission. (2011). European Green Capital Award Nantes 2012 2013. Chapter 3 Green Urban Areas.Available at: https://ec.europa.eu/environment/europeangreencapital/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/EGCNantesUKChap3-F.pdf. (Accessed: 23 June 2022).

Photos

@P.Garçon, Nantes Métropole