Novel products and services to support the sustainable management of European cities
Properly governed cities can combat the growing threat of societal issues. The challenge of urban governance is immense. This is because it must address the complex and interconnected reality of urban systems in order to secure a proper balance between the socioeconomic and environmental dynamics of cities. To address these societal concerns and secure effective governance, the EU-funded DECUMANUS (Development and consolidation of geospatial sustainability services for adaptation to environmental and climate change urban impacts) project created a set of sustainable services that allows city managers to incorporate geospatial products and geoinformation services in their climate and environmental change strategies. Project partners developed a portfolio of information services that tackle the key political concerns of Europe’s cities. They successfully validated the services in Antwerp, Helsinki, London, Madrid and Milan. The solutions include basic and premium product levels, and five customised decision-support services: urban climate atlas; land monitoring; energy efficiency; citizen health; and water quality. The basic products include freely available data provided by European public institutions that target the general public. The premium ones include data sets, indicators and models developed and specified together with local planning communities based on local data. All products can be accessed and managed using a dedicated geoportal built specifically for DECUMANUS. It enables customers and users to seamlessly exploit the complexity of the generated data without the need for geographic information system knowledge or additional software tools. DECUMANUS work and outcomes will allow urban planning managers to better coordinate the use of land and water resources, paving the way for successful delivery of sustainable development in cities across Europe.
Keywords
Climate change, urban development, DECUMANUS, geospatial sustainability services
