Strategy for Urban Nature - Copenhagen

The Strategy "Urban Nature in Copenhagen" (2015 - 2025) aims to ensure that the Danish capital develops into a green and climate-friendly city through two primary goals: (1) to create more urban nature in Copenhagen and (2) to improve the quality of the urban nature in the city. The strategy outlines 30 measures to contribute to these aims, including: an action plan for planting an additional 100,000 trees in the city, creating a catalogue of urban nature-based solutions, and establishing an Urban Nature Fund and building partnerships with various actors in the city. The strategy applies to all urban nature in Copenhagen on municipal as well as non-municipal land. The strategy builds upon and improves the ambition of a 2009 strategy "A green Copenhagen" and has been developed in cooperation with a variety of internal and external stakeholders. The strategy has resulted in the creation of a a Green Planning Tool and a Tree policy, among other outcomes.

Overview

Type of instrument:

Legislative, regulatory and strategic instruments›Dedicated strategy, plan, or law

Challenges addressed

Ecologic connectivity
Water management (e.g. reuse)
Green space management (e.g. accessibility)
Flood risk: pluvial and fluvial / soil permeability
Heat stress and heat island effect
Air quality
Social equity
Nature appropriation / stewardship
Reconnection to the biosphere / environmental education
Human health, comfort and well-being
Other, please specify

Biodiversity

Consideration of nature-based solutions:

The goal of the strategy if to bring more nature into the city, such as: green roofs and facades, street trees, streets designed to handle downpours, green urban spaces and green schoolyards. The strategy also aims to improve the quality of urban nature, using five quality parameters: biodiversity, climate adaptation, functionality, spatial qualities and care and maintenance. A focus is on how the inhabitants experience nature; one of the goals of the strategy is to increase the user satisfaction with the quality of the parks and other green areas. The strategy also aims to enhance awareness, ownership and understanding of urban nature among various groups in the city as well as increase access to nature, including a goal of 90% of inhabitants living within less than a 15 minute walk from the park or another nature area. Finally, the strategy aims to develop green links and corridors to improve ecological connectivity and recreational connections.

Targeted (peri-)urban areas:

Parks and (semi)natural urban green areas

Allotments, community gardens or agricultural areas

Blue areas

Green areas for water management

Derelict areas

External building greens

Urban green space connected to grey infrastructure

Good practice characteristics:

Support multifunctional NBS

Locally appropriate

Governance

Government body/bodies

Initiating body:

Municipality of Copenhagen

Instrument design:

Details about how the instrument was designed:

The strategy was developed by the City of Copenhagen Technical and Environmental administration in dialogue with the Economic Administration, the Culture and Leisure Administration and the Children and Youth Administration. A trigger to develop the strategy was pressure from politicians, grassroots organisations, citizens and the administration itself to create a comprehensive green strategy. As part of the preparation of the draft, the administration held cross-departmental working group meetings, a workshop with external stakeholders ranging from private investors, research institutions to frontrunners within green grassroots movements. In addition, the administration has held a separate working meeting with the Green Council. A draft version of the strategy was discussed by the municipality's Technical and Environmental Committee. It was then further consulted with selected stakeholders and finally submitted to and approved by the city council.

Involvement of non-governmental actors:

Public sector institution (e.g. school or hospital)

Private sector, corporate, business

Researchers, university

Citizens or community groups / NGOs

Type of actor involvement:

Civil society consultation through e.g. workshops, surveys

Instrument implementation:

Type of involvement:

The strategy covers all urban nature in Copenhagen, including nature on and off of land belonging to the municipality. The strategy therefore recognises the need for local support and cooperation with private landowners, business owners and others who are passionate about urban nature in Copenhagen in order to be successful in reaching its objectives. One of the four themes of the strategy is "Urban nature on non-municipal land". Under this theme, the city aims to carry out 50 partnership projects on non-municipal land per year with focus on urban nature and inspire 10% of Copenhageners to take active part in the effort to create more and better urban nature. The city indicates that it aims to create settings to inspire and motivate citizens to get involved in the efforts to create more urban nature in the city and to support communities that contribute to creating more and better urban nature in Copenhagen, such as community gardens and other voluntary associations.

Type of non-governmental actors involved:

Implementation of NBS (e.g. with government funds)

Targeted actors:

Public sector institution (e.g. school or hospital)

Private: household, real estate developer, business , financial

Researchers, university

Citizens or community groups (CBOs), NGOs

Financing

Budget:

Unknown

Details about instrument financing:

The strategy text states that the strategy is not fully funded and that funding should come from municipality's budget and be primarily found in the annual budget negotiations or by reallocating operational funds. The specific budget used to develop the strategy or which is foreseen to implement the strategy is not specified.

Monitoring, evaluation and impacts

Is a monitoring framework in place?:

Yes

The strategy has eight indicators, two for each of its four themes. Each of them has clearly defined baselines and data sources. However, there is no report on monitoring the strategy.

Did an evaluation take place?:

Achieved outcomes and impacts:

Based on a commitment made in the strategy, the City of Copenhagen has adopted a new policy for trees in the city – Copenhagen tree planting policy "2016-2025. The policy – outlining five political principles for management of urban trees – aims to make trees a greater priority in the city without hampering city development and ultimately achieving a 20% coverage of canopy in the city. As part of the strategy implementation, the city has also created a so-called Green Planning Tool in 2017. The green planning tool aims to help the city of Copenhagen to incorporate more and better urban nature into public construction projects and local development plans by calculating a green factor for each project site, which quantifies the scope and quality of the urban nature on site. To implement the strategy, the city has also drawn prioritisation plans to ensure reaching the strategy goal of planting 100,000 new trees. The plan forms the basis for prioritising investments in trees and organises the day-to-day work with trees in over the next few years.

Success factors and lessons learned:

The strategy defines its goals and translates their foreseen achievement into clearly defined actions. For example, one of the two headline goals of the strategy is to improve the quality of urban nature in Copenhagen. The strategy further defines five quality parameters (biodiversity, climate adaptation, functionality, spatial qualities, maintenance) as well as quality goals for different types of spaces (urban spaces, street spaces, parks, cemeteries and natural areas). Those quality requirements are integrated into accompanying tools such as the Green Planning Tool. The Tool additionally provides the municipality with the opportunity to document whether there really is more and better urban nature in municipal projects. The implementation of the strategy is supported by mainstreaming efforts in the municipality. Different service areas within the Technical and Environmental Administration have been asked to think about nature in the core business. Implementation of the strategy is also supported by communication activities such as an internal external lounge of the strategy, involving citizens, activation of existing creation of new networks and participation in conferences. The strategy was prepared in a participatory manner, involving consultations with citizens and key stakeholders, which also supports its implementation, especially as the strategy involves developing activities on private land.

Sources and further information

References

List of references:

City of Copenhagen (2015), Urban Nature in Copenhagen. Strategy 2015-2025. Available at: https://kk.sites.itera.dk/apps/kk_pub2/pdf/1653_EyzOS8ePZx.pdf

Biodiversity information system Europe (n.d.), Green Infrastructure in Denmark. Available at: https://biodiversity.europa.eu/countries/denmark/green-infrastructure

Notsund, M. (2019), Green Neighbourhood Streetscapes: assessing the challenges and opportunities of implementing Green Infrastructure in neighbourhood streetscapes using the cases of Nordhavnen & Västra Hamnen. Available at: https://projekter.aau.dk/projekter/files/306087070/Thesis_Notsund.pdf

City of Copenhagen (2022), Urban Nature, Available at: https://urbandevelopmentcph.kk.dk/urban-planning/urban-nature

City of Copenhagen (2015), Drøftelse af udkast til strategi for et grønt København. Available at: https://www.kk.dk/dagsordener-og-referater/Teknik-%20og%20Milj%C3%B8udvalget/m%C3%B8de-16032015/referat/punkt-18

City of Copenhagen (2015), UDKAST: Strategi for et grønt København (2015-2025). Available at: https://www.kk.dk/sites/default/files/agenda/90a5f95e-4837-4a81-ae30-d420b9cb4a23/60c55add-d1c2-4f39-8386-fd0758283a54-bilag-2.pdf

NIRAS (2017), Begrønningsværktøj skal gøre København grønnere, Available at: https://www.niras.dk/projekter/begroenningsvaerktoej/

Further documents

Documents:

urban-nature-in-copenhagen-strategy-2015-2025pdf-_1653.pdf

Photos

Ciudad de Copenhague