Urban Public Space Refurbishment, Szeged City

Area characterisation: 
  • Scale of the project: neighbourhood
  • Scales impacts from this NbS action should be assessed at neighbourhood and city levels.
  • Urban density in which the NbS is implemented: high (dense city center, etc.)

The Kölcsey street functioned as a parking place, it hadn't any trees or other vegetation. This street is next to Kárász street, which is the main shopping promenade of Szeged. The goal was the planting and to free the area of the cars.

Objective: 
  • Mitigate heat-island effect thanks to the use of NbS
  • Priorities pedestrian approach along the very busy street of Kölcsey and at the Reök Palace Square

Szeged is a mid-size historic city in the south of Hungary, the temperature is usually higher than in other similar-sized cities in the country. The goal of this project was to reduce the effects of the urban heat island in a very busy street with a lot of cars and shops. The idea was to increase the green area, plant trees, creating a more pleasant space for the pedestrians. The project has a significant effect which stimulated the economy as well.

The project is also combined with another environment friendly solution: Bio-sourced materials

NbS benefits 
  • Developing climate change adaptation; improving risk management and resilience
  • Developing climate change mitigation
  • Restoring ecosystems and their functions
  • Enhancing sustainable urbanisation
Transferability of the result: 

Process enablers:
Knowledge drivers → Awareness → NbS ambassadors
Governance drivers → cocreation and participation → reflective/adaptive governance
Economy drivers → Real estate 

The project implementation was coherent with the Green City Concept.

Process inhibitors:
Knowledge barriers → Uncertainty → Operation unknow
Governance barriers → Institutional barriers → Lack of coordination
Economy barriers → Perception of the benefits → Uncertain economic feasability

The owners of shops were unhappy because of the lack of parking lots, thus the shop-fitting became difficoult. It was necessary to introduce some special regulations for shops. A new parking garage was built in the proximinty of the area, but citizens needed some time to get used to the new regulations.


BUSINESS MODEL:
Business cluster: Technological
Business model: Maximize material productivity and energy efficiency
The model and the project was accurately prepared. There was a consultation with all regionally relevant authorities, thus the implementation process was fluent.

Temporal perspective

Expected time for the NbS to become fully effective after its implementation: short (immediately to few months)

Feedback: The project has already been adapted to new requisites

State of progress of the project: Project delivered (date unknow...)

Expected life time of the intervention: around 25 years

Financing: 

Global (estimated) cost of the project: 200k€- 1M€

FINANCIAL MODEL:
Financial cluster: cluster2 financial institution
Financial model: unknow
The 90% of cost was financed by European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), and the 10% of the cost was covered by the Szeged Municipality.

NbS classification 
  • Objects shapes (1)
  • On the ground (1)
  • Street trees
  • Objects shapes (2)
  • On the ground (2)
  • Structures associated with urban networks (2)
  • Planted car parks
Contacts: 

Ágnes , Igaz Dr. (author of the factsheet?)

hevizi.bianka@szeged.eu
Governmental agency (www.szegedvaros.hu)
Széchenyi square 10. Szeged, 6720, Hungary

Further information

Action plan 2007-2009 by Szeged Town Municipality (Kölcsey street and other actoin area). Published Documents on Home Page of Szeged Town


Nature4Cities (https://www.nature4cities.eu/) aims to develop a knowledge diffusion around Nature-Based Solution (NbS) and a decision support platform through new collaborative models.

This project is part of the Nature4Cities's pioneer case studies database, it will feed the observatory, NbS pre-selection and replication tools, gathered into the Geocluster4NBS.

This project was chosen as a pioneer case study for the following reasons: The Szeged Green City Programme was started with the implementation of this project. It was very important for the local authority to demonstrate the skills in implementation of urban green project. They made a large feasibility study on the implementation, the risks, cooperations neded and social acceptance of the project. A new business model was introduced too.

Nature4Cities project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreement No 730468.

Urban challenges
Climate issues: 
Climate mitigation
Climate adaptation
Water management and quality: 
Urban water management and quality
Air quality: 
Air quality locally
Biodiversity and urban space: 
Biodiversity
Urban space development and regeneration
Soil management: 
Soil management and quality
Resource efficiency: 
Recycling
Public health and well-being: 
Quality of life
Health
Environmental justice and social cohesion: 
Environmental justice
Social cohesion
Urban planning and governance: 
Urban planning and form
Governance in planning
People security: 
Control of extraordinary events
Green economy: 
Bioeconomy activities
Direct economic value of NBS
Key Performance Indicators: