URWAN
The project, approved under the Interreg Euro-MED program and the "Promoting Green Areas" mission, addresses two main challenges:
- Need to increase urban green areas to mitigate the effects of ongoing climate change;
- Optimizing the use of water for irrigation.
Mediterranean areas face severe droughts and water shortages, which have become major problems and real challenges for society. Our living areas are highly vulnerable to the effect of climate change, experiencing more and more extreme events. At the same time, decision makers plan investments to green cities without a long-term strategy on resource availability, impact, and related opportunities, while the transition to a greener environment requires an integrated vision, harmonized knowledge, and stakeholder empowerment.
In particular, there is a lack of knowledge about the use of existing nature-based solutions to support rational water use and transform our cities into greener cities.
URWAN addresses the critical link between urban regeneration and resources, leveraging the role of nature-based solutions in integrating water management and climate change adaptation.
The project involves 9 partners from 7 MED countries, who will jointly implement activities that influence decision-making to multiply the impacts of public fuFollow us on social media: nds.
The partnership uses innovative participatory approaches and existing NBSs, demonstrating the importance of making these solutions multifunctional.
The URWAN Catalogue for End Users harmonizes NBS knowledge using a creative style that reaches out to all local stakeholders and supports the co-design of appropriate NBSs to address challenges.
In addition, URWAN transforms 3 public buildings into "water producers," promoting urban green surfaces as place-based transformative potential through the implementation of transnational experimental interventions. The project engages decision makers and stakeholders from 6 cities to co-design multifunctional NBS under a climate change scenario and provide road maps for adaptation.
Through the Amplification Strategy and the Nature-Based Solutions Enabler Package, partners demonstrate and transfer the joint solutions and NBSs are disseminated.
The cutting-edge idea is to inspire decision makers to value NBSs as resources for generating urban sustainability, beauty and social inclusion, i.e., "needs behind functionality," as stated in the New European Bauhaus Initiative.
Project website: https://urwan.interreg-euro-med.eu
Follow us on social media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/urwanproject/
This project is supported by the Interreg Euro-MED Program with co-financing from the European Regional Development Fund.
