Applications for funding can be submitted to the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW) from 24 November 2020.
Information:
www.kfw.de/...Ladestationen...
About 30 percent of vertebrates and even more than 60 percent of invertebrates are nocturnal and can be affected by artificial light at night. The protection of the night must therefore be understood more strongly than before as a fundamental task of nature and landscape conservation, says Prof. Dr. Beate Jessel, President of BfN. The guide to action now published shows that it is possible to minimise the ecological damage caused by artificial lighting. It contains numerous concrete recommendations for action and practical tips for outdoor lighting.
Good lighting is efficient and reduces power consumption while increasing visibility and safety. It is aesthetically pleasing and minimises environmental impact. Many of the measures presented in the action guide are also simple and inexpensive to implement, is how IGB researcher and study leader Dr. Franz Hölker sums up the requirements. Franz Hölker's team is a leader in Germany and internationally in research into so-called light pollution. This is the term used when artificial light at night has a negative impact on humans and light-sensitive creatures. The guide is largely based on scientific findings that his working group, together with researchers from the BfN and the University of Münster, have gained over many years of work.
In the absence of explicit regulations for outdoor lighting, industrial standards for lighting are often treated in practice as legal provisions. In many cases, even the minimum requirements of the technical standards are far exceeded in order to exclude possible claims for damages, for example in the event of traffic accidents, and to prevent accusations that the street lighting does not comply with the state of the art. The result is that outdoor areas are often illuminated much more than necessary, with possible negative consequences for people and nature. However, it is possible to minimise the ecological impact of artificial lighting and at the same time meet social requirements such as safety and aesthetics.
The first author, Dr. Sibylle Schroer from the IGB, gives examples of solutions: Municipalities should use luminaires that do not emit light upwards. The illuminance should be as low as possible and cold white light with a high blue light content should be avoided. This is because the circadian system of higher vertebrates and humans is particularly sensitive to blue light. The use of warm white light can mitigate the negative effects on many organisms and is often perceived as more pleasant by humans.
The interdisciplinary collaboration with the lawyer for environmental and planning law, Benedikt Huggins from the University of Münster, uncovered gaps in environmental law in order to better protect organisms from exposure to poorly installed, unnecessary or excessively bright artificial light in the future. The recommendations were made on the basis of the two research and development projects Analysis of the effects of artificial light on biodiversity, Determination of indicators of impairment and derivation of recommendations for action to avoid negative effects in the context of interventions and Light and glass: Legal issues of the endangerment of species by light and glass, funded by the Federal Ministry for the Environment and accompanied in terms of content by the BfN.
The restriction of light pollution brings further advantages, for example in terms of energy savings and thus climate protection, as well as for human health. The guide offers those responsible in local authorities as well as those responsible for lighting, urban and regional planning a free professional decision-making aid to actively promote the conscious use of artificial light.
More information here
Source: Federal Agency for Nature Conservation, press release, 20.01.2020
Keywords:
Greening / climate adaptation, DE-News, Artificial light, Media, Near-natural open space design, New books and studies, Permaculture, Transition Town, Wildlife/animal friendly construction, Ecology
Difu city survey "OB-Barometer 2020" gives municipalities' assessment of the future*
Berlin/Cologne. Climate protection and adaptation to the consequences of climate change will become increasingly important for cities. This is one of the findings of the survey of (Lord) Mayors of large German cities* conducted by the German Institute of Urban Affairs in January and February 2020. Almost two-thirds of the respondents named climate protection as an important municipal issue for the future. This means that the number of mayors who attribute an increase in importance to this field of municipal policy action has more than tripled compared to the previous year. Future surveys will show how strongly this result was influenced by the protests of the 'Fridays for Future' movement.
More than half of the respondents also see a growing need for action in the area of mobility. This topic, which already ranked second among the future topics last year, has thus once again gained in importance for city leaders. This may also have something to do with the fact that urban mobility is an essential aspect of municipal climate protection. The top future topic of the two previous years, digitalization, is in third place in the survey among the most important future topics for municipal policy. A good third of respondents believe that digitisation will become more important for cities in the next five years. Other municipal policy issues to which the mayors attach particularly high relevance for the future are the creation of affordable housing, the financial situation of the cities and the strengthening of the economy.
City leaders agree that the future challenges facing cities will require a high level of funding. This is particularly true for the topics of mobility and climate protection. Almost 90 percent of those for whom these are key issues for the future expect to have to make large or very large investments in these areas. The situation is similar in the areas of digitisation and the creation of affordable housing: here, around three quarters of the city leaders who see digitisation and housing among the most important future issues for cities still consider the future financing requirements in these policy areas to be high or very high.
* The survey was conducted before the Corona pandemic in Germany pushed other issues into the background. Even if normality should have returned to some extent in the cities after the state of emergency, the view of the political decision-makers on the municipal world will be different. Difu will therefore publish the full results of the OB-Barometer 2020 at a later date, possibly linked to current surveys that include "Corona aspects". This report therefore focuses primarily on the sub-area of "future issues".
Source: PM Difu from 12.5.2020
Keywords:
DE-News, Renewable, Climate emergency, Climate protection, Communities, New books and studies, City, Transition Town, Environmental policy
A most welcome piece of news reached the city of Aachen this morning (17 March 2021): Federal Minister Horst Seehofer has announced this year's selection of the "National Projects of Urban Development" and announced that the development of the Büchel old town quarter will receive up to 5.5 million euros in funding. Aachen is thus one of four municipalities in NRW to have been awarded the contract. With the amount of funding, the city is in third place nationwide.
OBin Keupen: "We feel the spirit of optimism!"
"This is a great message for our city," says Mayor Sibylle Keupen in her first reaction. "We have long felt the spirit of optimism around the Büchel in Aachen. The demolition of the multi-storey car park is imminent, the planning workshop was a great success, many groundbreaking political decisions have been made, and more are on the horizon. Above all, many city makers are on board and want to be involved in a very concrete way. They want to participate, to shape, to plan, to build. The fact that this high level of commitment of all those involved here on site has now also triggered such a response at federal level encourages us to continue on the path of 'making a city at Büchel'."
City Planning Director Burgdorff: "Aachen can play in the Bundesliga!"
The municipal councillor for urban development, construction and mobility, Frauke Burgdorff, adds: "I am extremely pleased that Aachen, if it sticks together, can also play in the Bundesliga! Aachen's politicians have united behind the project and have given their backing to the state and federal governments. Thank you for that! But I would also like to express my sincere thanks to those who have done the substantive work here on site, to the municipal project manager Nils Jansen as well as to Christoph Guth and Antje Eickhoff, who have done an excellent job on the part of the municipal development company SEGA."
Making town at the Büchel
A special piece of the city at eye level is to be created at Büchel. It is being developed together with many committed people and institutions. With this approach, it has also precisely met the requirements of the call for proposals. The Federal Ministry's project overview states: "Knowledge, living, meadow" are the keywords under which a mixed-use, urban quarter is to be created in the heart of Aachen's old town in a cooperative and exemplary development process that is wanted and supported by the urban community.
The basis for the development is the exploratory procedure "Stadt machen am Büchel" (Making a city at Büchel), which the city of Aachen launched in spring 2020. City Planning Director Burgdorff sums up: "A multi-storey car park has been blocking the development of the old town for decades. We are tearing it down and building a new urban quarter. The urban community itself is developing the programme, urban design and investment strategy. This project offers a unique opportunity to find answers to the question of how a major wound in the old city can be healed with contemporary building-cultural responses."
The next steps
Following today's basic commitment by the federal government to fund the project, the detailed applications for funding will be drawn up in phase 2. In this ongoing process - and on the basis of upcoming landmark decisions of Aachen's municipal politics - it will now be worked out how the Büchel of the future will take shape with the funding millions.
National urban development projects
National urban development projects are nationally and internationally visible, larger-scale urban development projects with clear impulses for the respective municipality or city, the region and urban development policy in Germany as a whole. They are characterised by a special quality standard with regard to the urban development approach, the building culture aspects and the participation processes, contribute to the realisation of the federal government's building policy objectives and have innovation potential. National urban development projects are projects that generally solve tasks and problems of considerable financial dimension. The focus is on the major challenges currently facing cities and municipalities in Germany (e.g. preservation of existing buildings, conversions, sustainable neighbourhood development).
A total of 24 projects for forward-looking urban development are being funded by the federal government with a total of around 75 million euros. 98 cities and municipalities from all over Germany applied for the funding.
More info
Interesting facts about the Büchel can be found on the Internet at
www.buechel-aachen.de
From Aprill 2021 the Demolition work on the Büchel multi-storey car park. All the info on this has been presented as part of an online event. The stream is still available on the YouTube channel of the city of Aachen:
https://youtu.be/KQqFq6v_edA.
Within the framework of a cooperative planning workshop, three teams of experts developed three exciting designs for the Büchel, each with a focus on the major themes of "knowledge, living, meadow". The final presentation of the planning workshop, which took place digitally in January 2021, is also still available as a stream:
https://youtu.be/AWSb5Gx3gKA.
Source: PM of the city of Aachen from 17.03.2021
Keywords:
DE-News, Funding, New building area, News Blog NRW, Mix of uses, Participation, Quarters, City, Transition Town
Forest Minister Peter Hauk MdL: "With our call for ideas, we want to further promote municipal timber construction in the state and further consolidate our nationwide position as the No. 1 timber construction state".
A total of around 6.5 million euros in funding from the Baden-Württemberg timber construction campaign is available for the call for ideas for municipal timber construction concepts.
The online application deadline is February 12, 2020.
"In view of the global climate development, there is no way around the increased use of wood as a renewable and climate-friendly building and insulation material. Only buildings with a high proportion of wood can store larger amounts of carbon over centuries. With our call for ideas, we want to further promote municipal timber construction in the state and further consolidate our nationwide position as the No. 1 timber construction state," said the Minister for Rural Areas and Consumer Protection, Peter Hauk MdL, in Stuttgart on Friday (13 November). The aim is to establish Baden-Württemberg as a model of climate-conscious building culture. As far as possible, the state's building projects would be implemented in timber and timber hybrid construction. Now the state is also supporting the municipalities in their development towards climate-friendly construction with wood.
"The call for ideas focuses primarily on municipal concepts and approaches in urban development that lead to the implementation of timber construction projects. We are looking for new innovative approaches, for example in our own properties, neighbourhood development or the creation of entire settlements", explained Minister Hauk. This requires committed and innovative municipalities that lead the way as trendsetters. The ideas competition is intended to provide incentives for this. "Those who build with the renewable raw material wood protect the climate and strengthen regional economic cycles. The timber and mixed timber construction methods are ideal, for example, for adding on to existing buildings, closing gaps between buildings or renovating existing buildings", explained the Minister. Numerous projects are already proving that high-quality and sustainable further development of urban and rural areas with wood is economical and brings added value for the population.
The state is therefore promoting greater climate awareness in the construction industry with the Baden-Württemberg timber construction offensive. Wood is the only relevant building material that has a favourable CO2-balance and achieves an immediate storage effect. Thanks to innovative processing with low energy consumption, wood is used in a wide variety of forms and can contribute to a sustainable building culture with architectural accents.
Municipalities are invited to submit approaches to planning and building with wood in building construction. These can be initial ideas that must be assigned to one of the following four categories:
1. development and conception of the construction and renovation of own properties,
2. instruments and approaches of urban planning / development,
3. information, advice and education of those willing to build by the municipalities (communication)
4. other/special route.
The submission of ideas for the planning of individual objects, as well as neighbourhood and settlement approaches, consulting and qualification offers (internal and external), communication strategies and public relations, but also other formats in the municipal planning context are conceivable.
The call is designed to be low-threshold in order to address many municipalities. In a two-stage application process, a rough concept is first submitted online in the form of a short idea sketch. After an evaluation by a group of experts, selected municipalities have the chance to deepen the project idea and prepare it for implementation. Financial support of up to 20,000 euros each is available for this (1st stage). After a positive evaluation, there is the possibility of receiving further funding of up to 400,000 euros in the second stage for the implementation of their project idea (2nd stage).
The deadline for submitting a short outline of ideas via the online application is 12 February 2021 (1st stage). Interested municipalities can find more information on the website of the Timber Construction Offensive at www.holzbauoffensivebw.de
Keywords:
Funding, Wood construction, News Blog Baden-Württemberg, Quarters, Environmental policy, Housing
