Read this article in another language : Dutch • French • Spanish
The Province of Limburg has created a list with tons of climate actions for the entire city council. Do you still have colleagues at the Culture and Leisure department who are not aware of the advantages of an ambitious climate plan? Show them which actions are achievable and how they will benefit your whole city!
🤫 At the end of the article you will find a link to a lot of inspiring actions from the city of Bruges.
Grab a pen and paper and write down your favorite actions. Take your shortlist to the Culture and Leisure department of your city to make the actions concrete!
⚠️ Polluting infrastructure and transportation
Infrastructure and relocations to and from the sites cause a lot of emissions. The buildings and car parks also mean concretion, extra water consumption and reduced space for green and blue spaces.
🏆 What to do as a city
Betting on more sustainable cultural buildings and the relocation of them makes your city much more attractive for tourism. Green spaces at recreational areas and youth facilities increase the quality of life in your city.
Write down the most realistic actions for your city for each theme below 👇
1. Focus on measures in municipal sports facilities, youth rooms, cultural accommodation, monuments and tourist infrastructure 🏛
- Look for all your infrastructure and accommodations where you can apply green roofs, water-saving measures, less paving, better insulation, energy-efficient heating and ventilation systems.
- Provide sustainable lighting on monuments and sports fields.
- Encourage the use of renewable energy.
- Give subsidies for energy-efficient and climate-friendly investments.
- Have studies carried out for the redesign of lighting. Perform relighting.
- Promote multifunctional use of sports and tourism infrastructure.
- Provide shade to youth rooms and sports facilities through trees, awnings, ...
2. Focus on sustainable tourism 📷
- Promote local, sustainable tourism, traveling in your own region (for example, competition with accommodation in your own region as a price).
- Put valuable walking areas in the spotlight and improve them with high-quality infrastructure such as benches, plank paths, reception points, ...
- Invest in landscaping and landscape design near the walking and cycling paths.
- Work out a walking / cycling route that goes through sustainable initiatives in the municipality.
- Encourage tourism organizations to opt for sustainable food (local, organic, vegetarian, seasonal, ...).
3. Focus on climate-friendly behaviour 🤔
- Stimulate rational energy consumption through an energy subsidy. An example: Every youth association receives a basic package of 500 kWh of free electricity. This is sufficient for an energy-efficient refrigerator and freezer, minimal lighting, activities, ... The extra electricity that they consume is charged more expensive. The less extra power they use, the lower the costs.
- Campaign to sports, youth and cultural associations about their commuting behavior.
- When renting out municipal accommodation, include agreements on rational energy consumption and climate-friendly behavior in the lease.
- Encourage event organizers to organize their event in a climate-friendly way and set a good example when organizing their own events.
4. Focus on sustainable mobility 🚴♀️
- Provide sufficient and safe cycling infrastructure at the sports, cultural and youth accommodations.
- Use the SPPP principle (first steps, then pedals, then public transport and then passenger transport) in the communication about the accessibility of all accommodations.
- Provide sufficient green space for sports and exercise in the city / village center. This reduces the pressure on nature reserves and the related mobility needs.
5. Focus on dealing with heat stress ☀️🌡️
- Prepare a health plan for warm days for municipal events, sports camps and youth associations (drinking water, shade, food safety, ...)
- Ask sports and youth associations to take measures in the event of heat or to draw up a health plan for hot days.
6. Focus on education and participation 👨🏫
- Organize an educational project on climate and call on associations to participate.
- Organize a campaign about climate-friendly behavior for associations.
- Set up a climate panel with young people and support it with sufficient resources and cooperation with climate experts.
- Organize a climate competition between the various local youth organizations.
- Organize a film, show or exhibition on the theme of climate to raise awareness about the theme.
- Give credit to sustainable initiatives.
👏 Finished your list? Schedule a meeting with the Culture and Leisure department to discuss your ideas. Good luck!
Focusing on Culture and Leisure is important for tourism and quality of life. However, including other city services in your plans is as important to make your city an enjoyable place to live and work in.
FutureproofedCities allows all different city services to work together in one online tool to realise more climate actions and communicate them to their inhabitants. 💡 Check out Bruges' public page to see how they tackle climate challenges
(Source: Province of Limburg)
Curious for climate actions for other departments? Subscribe to our monthly newsletter to receive all articles.
