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A new plan has been made for the sustainable regeneration
of a certain area in the Randstad. The water management systems and transport
infrastructure were redesigned according to sustainability principles. This
leads, among others, to the introduction of more surface water in places where
former roadways then have to be closed (which fits in a traffic calming design
scheme). The rainwater is proposed to drain away naturally; this leaves an
overcapacity of the sewage system. New buildings have been proposed, bringing
multifunctional activities in the former monofunctional housing area. New
infrastructures for these buildings can be cheap: public transport, due to
densification; efficient energy systems through cogeneration plants and use of
existing sewer capacities because of the newly created “overcapacity”. The
municipality must invest in this. The environmental and social benefits will
come later: safer public spaces, less traffic incidents, less air pollution,
better water quality, lower costs for maintenance of ecological greenery, and
so on. But investments are large, and others (for instance housing
corporations) will profit because of lower costs, for instance for water and
energy. Conventional cost-benefit calculations do not deal with such
intersectoral approaches, and with different time horizons in public investment
and maintenance schemes. There is no system in place to cope with this. The
designed sustainability scheme is now endangered. Urban environmental plans (energy management
plans, waste management plans, air protection plans, water plans, etc), land
use plans and socio-economic plans in some countries reflect the
above-mentioned fragmented organisation of activities at regional/national
level. Therefore local ability to produce strategic, integrated, negotiated,
action-oriented plans and programmes is weak.
When it comes to the regeneration of post-war urban areas,
the responsible housing organisations will in many cases immediately jump to
CONCLUSIONS such as tearing buildings down and building new, more expensive,
houses. They expect that this will lead to more income spent in these areas and
thus to reduction of neglect, unsafety and pollution. A more balanced strategy,
based on an appropriate analysis of the strengths and opportunities of these
areas, will take more time. Profits will not be gained immediately, but over a
longer time. Such strategies have been developed in Europe, but the transfer of relevant
know-how is extremely limited. Often the responsible organisations are not well
equipped, not informed enough and have too little professionally educated
experts for the task. |