Biodiverse Cities

🌱 🌡 Looking to escape the heat this summer? Head to your nearest park! As cities across Europe brace for heatwaves, green spaces offer their communities invaluable climate refuges. Stay tuned for our fact series to discover the many advantages of building #BiodiverseCities and find out more about our work 👉 https://lnkd.in/dec2VUED Gemeente Dordrecht Interreg North Sea Programme Växjö kommun Bergen kommune Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Aarhus University University of Bremen Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving Het Vogelnest Bremer Umwelt Beratung Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Ville de Lille BrestLife IUCN  #NatureBasedSolutions #UrbanResilience #Sustainability #Biodiversity #Coexistence #GreenCities #ClimateAdaptation #ClimateChangeMitigation #heatwave #ClimateRefuge

📣 Ready to debunk myths and uncover mind-shifting stories on nature restoration and management? Join us at #NetworkNature Annual Event and explore inspiring approaches for people and nature, with people and nature 🔗 Secure your spot now! https://lnkd.in/e3b3K_MV 📅 25th September, 2024 📍 Théâtre National, Brussels, Belgium Let’s turn myths into opportunities and unlock the potential of #NatureBasedSolutions in 🌿 Restoring nature 🌿 Nature governance 🌿 Valuing nature You want to contribute? 🖼 Showcase your case study at the event and shed light on real-life #NbS examples : https://lnkd.in/e6QfuWfz Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) ICLEI Europe IUCN European Regional Office UNEP-WCMC Steinbeis Europa Zentrum ALTAMIRA Horizon Nua Biodiversa+ Fondation pour la Recherche sur la Biodiversité

And it's a wrap! Over 1,500 attendees from around the world gathered in São Paulo, Brazil, for four action-packed days at the ICLEI World Congress 2024 🎬 🇧🇷 Running from 18 – 21 June, the Congress drew to a close, but our collective journey towards sustainable development is only gaining momentum! We extend a heartfelt thank you to all Members of our Network, as well as subnational and national leaders, experts, researchers, urban practitioners, implementers, and stakeholders who joined us in person to advance sustainable urban development and equitable adaptation to local and regional challenges head-on. Together, we are transforming commitments into action. We especially thank our host, the City of São Paulo Cidade de São Paulo, for its support and contributions to the ICLEI World Congress 2024 and its warm welcome during these insightful work days. 📹 Watch our Day 4 recap from the #ICLEIWorldCongress 2024 and stay tuned for further updates and outcomes: https://lnkd.in/dwkMFaw #Sustaintability #ClimateAction #LocalLeadership ICLEI Oceania , ICLEI Africa, ICLEI Canada, ICLEI USA, ICLEI Europe, ICLEI South Asia, ICLEI Southeast Asia Secretariat, ICLEI East Asia Secretariat, ICLEI América do Sul

Urban trees: 🌳Reduce energy use 🏙Improve water quality 🌴Increase property values They are #biodiversity heroes in concrete jungles. Via FAO

💤 🐝 Have you ever heard a bee snore? To inspire us with all the hidden wonders biodiversity offers, Gemeente Dordrecht's city ecologist Sjoerd-Dirk Fiaschi-van der Est shared an anecdote about his recent discovery of a snoring bee in the Arden mountains of Belgium. The inspiration arrives at a perfect time, as Dordrecht is in the midst of mapping 10,000 species and posing the fundamental question: what role does biodiversity play in our ecosystem? Discover more about their initiative to learn about the diverse forms of life that coexist with us 👇 #BiodiverseCities #CommunityEngagement Interreg North Sea Programme Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving Ville de Lille Växjö kommun Bergen kommune Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Aarhus University University of Bremen Het Vogelnest Bremer Umwelt Beratung Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Dana Huibers Ellen Kelder Berry Gersonius Ifor Schrauwen Malena Heinrup Sofia Gustavsson Christof Voßeler Pil Pedersen Sara Iversen Michael Flitner Susanna Gionfra María Nuñez Rodríguez Valérie AMIS Nelly Gillet Karlotta-Franziska Seitz Patrick Limpens Gideon Spanjar Pernille Villesen Karen Tvedt Marianne Nieuwjaer Hugo VOISVENEL Cédric Devigne Juliette Plouvin Amélie Billoir Ina Bakka Sem-Olsen Lars Eg Hoppe Marius Wittmann

"With good co-creation, there are always surprising elements in the outcome that the designers had not foreseen in advance." Dive into co-creation and citizen engagement with this closer look at the recent transnational peer learning session led by Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving during our partner meeting in Ville de Lille! Find out more about their work 👉 https://lnkd.in/gBWjvwFQ #BiodiverseCities #CommunityEngagement Interreg North Sea Programme Växjö kommun Bergen kommune Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Aarhus University University of Bremen Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving Het Vogelnest Bremer Umwelt Beratung Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Dana Huibers Ellen Kelder Berry Gersonius Ifor Schrauwen Malena Heinrup Sofia Gustavsson Christof Voßeler Pil Pedersen Sara Iversen Michael Flitner Susanna Gionfra María Nuñez Rodríguez Valérie AMIS Nelly Gillet Karlotta-Franziska Seitz Patrick Limpens Gideon Spanjar Pernille Villesen Karen Tvedt Marianne Nieuwjaer Hugo VOISVENEL Cédric Devigne Juliette Plouvin Amélie Billoir Ina Bakka Sem-Olsen Lars Eg Hoppe Marius Wittmann

📸 🐛 The latest instalment of our BioBlitz tradition is here! Each time our Biodiverse Cities team meets, we do a mini BioBlitz to explore the wide range of biodiversity in our host city. Last week, our team captured some beautiful images of the plants, fungi, insects, and animals that call Ville de Lille home. We wrapped up with a small awards ceremony, with the winners including: 🐝 Ina Bakka Sem-Olsen with the most bee-autiful photo 🔍 Lars Eg Hoppe with the most unexpected biodiversity find 🐟 Marius Wittmann with the best catch/capture BioBlitzes offer an exciting opportunity to get immersed in our local ecosystems and discover the vast world of biodiversity living right under our noses. We're looking forward to continuing this tradition in our next meeting! #BiodiverseCities #CommunityEngagement Interreg North Sea Programme Växjö kommun Bergen kommune Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Aarhus University University of Bremen Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving Het Vogelnest Bremer Umwelt Beratung Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Dana Huibers Ellen Kelder Berry Gersonius Ifor Schrauwen Malena Heinrup Sofia Gustavsson Christof Voßeler Pil Pedersen Sara Iversen Michael Flitner Susanna Gionfra María Nuñez Rodríguez Valérie AMIS Nelly Gillet Karlotta-Franziska Seitz Patrick Limpens Gideon Spanjar Pernille Villesen Karen Tvedt Marianne Nieuwjaer Hugo VOISVENEL Cédric Devigne Juliette Plouvin Amélie Billoir

The Ville de Lille is one of the cities in Biodiverse Cities in the North Sea region that has set out to become #BiodiverseCities, and we had the pleasure of visiting our partners in #Lille last week. Marianne Nieuwjaer with Amélie Billoir, Cédric Devigne, Juliette Plouvin and Hugo VOISVENEL showed the Biodiverse Cities team some wonderful nature-based-solutions that have already been implemented in recent years in Lille. Spotlight on just some of many highlights: 🌃 Reduction of #lightpollution around the urban river Deûle and its renaturation. #Flora and #fauna can return to rest at night or can be active undisturbed. Rare #bats 🦇 have already been spotted thanks to the night-time #lightswitchoff. 🏡 Owners of #urban #buildings are supported by the city of Lille with the implementation of greening their façades. I have rarely seen so many green façades in urban areas. And there's the potential for more. 🌳 🚲 🐧 🐛 🐜 Traffic streets are being renatured from grey to green #morethanhuman zones, increasing #ecologicalconnectivity for animals to commute through the city, #morebicyclelanes and #pedestrianzones, #less #cars. This has an incredibly beneficial effect on health in terms of noise reduction, ambient temperature and, contrary to skeptics, the streets are full of life and #fossilfreemobility. 🐌 🐞 🐝 🛍 🚴♀️ 🚶♂️ 🏃♀️ 👥 In the context of the Biodiverse-Cities-Project, the team of the city of Lille is explicitly implementing greening projects in three pilot areas in Lille, which are #cocreated together with the #local #neighborhood to make the use of #public #green #space #sustainable on the long run for a good urban life for #people & #nature. As part of the #BiodiverseCities #scientific #knowledge partners, I am very enthusiastic about accompanying the co-creation processes for more social greening here in Lille, but as well in #Dordrecht, #Aarhus, #Bremen and #Växjö and in the pollinator cities #Brest, #Hamburg and #Bergen. Together with Jurrian Arnold from #OpenKaart, our team at University Bremen provided #guiding #criteria for content and process-oriented co-creation projects to increase social green in the city sustainably. Such as modes of #communicaton with #citizens to reach out, building #sustainable #relations with citizens and stakeholders when building common ground, including #diverse #perspectives of #future #users of social greens, #empowering citizens in urban place-making for nature and people, but as well to include enough #design #freedom for co-creation processes to increase urban social green and many more. 🌳 🌻 🏵 👭 🚶♂ 🚣♀️ 🚴♂️ Very much looking forward to ongoing vibrant #BiodiverseCities, especially during the cities flora and fauna high season in the upcoming months 🌿 The Ville de Lille can soon consider to add the “City of Biodiversity” story of its unique urban-history-strip told on graphic wallpaper in its reception hall in the city hall, see the pictures below ⏬ 🎨 😀 🏡

🌿 Our Biodiverse Cities Partner Meeting has concluded in Ville de Lille 🌿 Together we are taking steps towards our mission of building more nature-inclusive urban societies. Over the past few days, we explored topics such as: 🤝 NBS Co-Creation: The University of Bremen and Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving hosted a Transnational Peer Learning session where they shared state-of-the-art methodologies and knowledge on co-creation and citizen engagement. 🌳 NBS Barriers: Aeres University of Applied Science Almere presented their work mapping the governance barriers cities often encounter when implementing NBS to increase the benefits of better functioning urban ecosystems. 🐛The Urban BioScope: Our project has developed the Urban BioScope, a citizen science tool designed for monitoring NBS, and is being tested across our pilots! 🌱 Green Initiatives in Lille: Our host city for this meeting, is taking action to tackle the biodiversity crisis: squares will replace car parks, and trafficked streets will become pedestrianised. They have installed more biodiversity-friendly street lights and air bridges for squirrels by the Citadel. If you want to know what our project is about in a nutshell, check out our freshly released: https://lnkd.in/gbXHeQGP Next stop: Växjö in September! We look forward to visit their Telestadhöjden Wetland and Gemla Preschool pilots and continuing this journey, sharing more innovative solutions for our urban environments 🌿🌍✨ Learn more about their pilots 👇 https://lnkd.in/gsznknbB https://lnkd.in/gYJwrPSQ A big thank you Lille for hosting us, with special thanks to Marianne Nieuwjaer, Hugo VOISVENEL, Cédric Devigne, Juliette Plouvin and Amélie Billoir! #BiodiverseCities #CommunityEngagement Interreg North Sea Programme Växjö kommun Bergen kommune Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Aarhus University University of Bremen Het Vogelnest Bremer Umwelt Beratung Aeres University of Applied Science Almere Dana Huibers Ellen Kelder Berry Gersonius Ifor Schrauwen Malena Heinrup Sofia Gustavsson Christof Voßeler Lars Eg Hoppe Pil Pedersen Sara Iversen Michael Flitner Susanna Gionfra María Nuñez Rodríguez Valérie AMIS Nelly Gillet Ina Bakka Sem-Olsen Karlotta-Franziska Seitz Marius Wittmann Patrick Limpens Gideon Spanjar Pernille Villesen Karen Tvedt

An excellent 2nd day for the #Sustainscapes team from #AarhusUniversity at the #BiodiverseCities project meeting hosted by the city of Lille, France. In particular, two excellent presentations given by Professor Michael Flitner from University of Bremen and Jurrian Arnold from Open Kaart | co-creatie van de leefomgeving on the qualities of co-creation in Nature-based Solution projects and green urban planning, coupled with experiences from our collaborative city partners from northwestern Europe. How to co-create and when? And at what level? How do we manage conflict and is it always always right to aim for co-creation in every case? Important questions discussed and knowledgesharing of experiences. The Biodiverse Cities project aims to accelerate action for biodiversity by implementing urban investments programmes enriched with innovative NbS that halt biodiversity loss, support ecosystem services and balance the co-existence of people and nature, towards nature-inclusive societies. Visit our website to learn about our work and project partners here: https://lnkd.in/eRYWbKnA