Living Cities: Europe’s mayors have their say (2024)

A conversation on what makes a livable city.

By AITOR HERNÁNDEZ-MORALES

With GIOVANNA COI

Send tips here | Tweet @aitorehm | View in your browser

Happy Thursday, city-lovers!

This week we bring you a sneak peek at the results of this year’s Eurocities Pulse Mayors Survey, shedding light on the priorities and concerns of those leading Europe’s major cities.

Further down, we dig into their take on the housing crisis, and what they’re asking the EU to do about it.

METRO BRIEFING

MAYORS HAVE THEIR SAY: Ahead of next week’s Eurocities Summit in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, the network of more than 200 European cities carried out a new edition of its Pulse Mayors Survey. Ninety-two mayors representing cities in 28 countries shed insight on priority issues, including climate change, housing, inequality, migration and economic regeneration. Living Cities is pleased to offer our readers an exclusive first look.

Climate, climate, climate: Climate remains the top challenge and priority for surveyed mayors. More than a quarter of the bloc’s local leaders said that global warming was the biggest threat facing their city, while 67 percent of those surveyed said it was the top issue their administration seeks to address. More than two-thirds of the mayors said they felt the majority of their citizens demanded action on decarbonization policies. But they also expressed concerns about the public anger over green measures seen in cities like London and Brussels, where citizens have protested initiatives to slash car use and improve air quality. Thirty-eight percent of survey participants said they were concerned about backlash to climate policies.

Going green: Ninety-four percent of the mayors said that their top challenge for implementing climate change measures was public funding access. Local leaders varied, however, on how they’d use cash if they had it: Nearly a quarter wanted more urban vegetation, while an equal amount sought to invest in energy efficiency and decarbonization measures. One in 5 wanted to execute more nature-based solutions, while 1 in 10 said building adaptations were crucial.

Show me the money: Europe’s cities have been on the front lines of major crises over the past few years: Mayors have had to respond to the pandemic, take in refugees from war-torn Ukraine and deal with the dramatic spike in energy and the cost of living. Alas, more than

half of the participants said they hadn’t received additional resources to manage these new responsibilities. Moreover, 38 percent of the local leaders complained that national governments had imposed austerity measures on them, further reducing their budgets. More than half the mayors complained that the lack of funds impeded them from hiring staff and addressing their key challenges.

Brussels wish list: Ahead of June’s European Parliament election — and the formation of a new European Commission — the bloc’s mayors listed the issues they think require Brussels’ urgent attention. About half the mayors said they needed EU cash for sustainable urban mobility infrastructure, ranging from trams to bike lanes. Nearly half of survey participants want a long-term strategy to get the EU and cities to work together, and more than a third want Brussels to explicitly recognize local investment as a path for greater European integration. Climate, of course, was also listed as a top concern in this regard; 35 percent of mayors want the EU to create a “real” social climate fund that is present even at the local level.

Check out the full survey here.

CITY HIGHLIGHTS

NAMED AND SHAMED: U.S. diplomats are the most shameless scofflaws when it comes to unpaid congestion charge fees in the British capital, transit agency Transport for London revealed this week. According to its data, the U.S. Embassy has neglected to pay £14.6 million in fees, followed by Japanese and Indian diplomats with debts of £10.1 million and £8.6 million, respectively. An estimated £143.5 million is owed by diplomatic delegations in London alone.

HOME SWEET PRISON: Ahead of next months regional elections in Belgium, Brussels Region Urbanism Minister Ans Persoons this week announced that her Vooruit party will seek to turn the capital’s Forest and Saint-Gilles prisons into dazzling residential complexes during the next legislative turn. Both of the Dickensian penitentiary complexes are in the process of being closed and there’s heated debate about what to do with the prime real estate on which they sit. Persoons proposes the sites’ immediate use as artists’ studios, and its longer-term transformation into housing for essential workers who are at risk of having the housing crisis squeeze them out of the city. “Go to jail” never sounded so good…

PRIDE MULTIPLIED: Amsterdam announced recently that its traditional Pride Week will now be held through the entire month of July starting in 2025 in order to spread events across the city and give smaller organizations more chances to participate. Local authorities have also committed to flying the intersex-inclusive pride flag, — which includes a purple circle in a yellow area — along with the traditional rainbow stripes.

PARLEZ-VOUS TOURISME? Paris’ Chamber of Commerce has launched an updated version of its “Do you speak tourism?” manual to help the French capital’s famously brusque merchants deal with foreign visitors during this summer’s Olympic Games. The 30-page manual encourages them to “give the best image of France” by actually responding to questions posed by l’étrangers instead of just rolling their eyes and dismissively puffing smoke in their face.

UPTOWN/DOWNTOWN

⬆ GREEN WIEN: Work is underway to green Vienna’s iconic Michaelerplatz, the imperial square that houses one of the entrances to the Hofburg palace and serves as a major intersection in the city’s old quarter. The site — surrounded by grand, stone buildings — was in danger of becoming a heat sink in summer; city authorities are working with monument protection experts to install trees and flower beds to ensure the area remains welcoming even as temperatures rise.

Vienna’s Michaelerplatz hosts the northeast entrance to the Hofburg Palace. | Creative Commons

⬇ LEGALITY IS THE EXCEPTION, NOT THE RULE: Data published by Madrid’s City Hall this week shows that only 1,008 of the 13,502 short-term rental apartments operating in the city — just 7.5 percent of the total — are legal. According to the data, not one of the Spanish capital’s 21 districts is spared from excessive tourism; the worst hit is the Centro area, where more than 15 percent of residential properties are tourist flats.

URBAN TRENDS

GIMME SHELTER: The effects of Europe’s housing crisis are most evident at the city level. With skyrocketing rental and home prices exacerbating the issue, it’s no surprise that the number of European mayors listing access to affordable housing as a top priority in the Eurocities Pulse survey has doubled in just 12 months. While 15 percent mentioned the challenge last year, in the latest poll more than a third say listed it as a key concern ahead of the European Parliament election.

Everyone’s problem: Historically, access to decent housing was seen as problematic only for low-income residents. Today, however, local leaders across the bloc say that soaring rent and home prices have turned it into a middle-class challenge too. “We are facing a severe shortage of decent, affordable and adequate housing,” said Renaud Payre, a vice president of the Métropole deLyon, an authority encompassing the city of Lyon and its suburbs. “Front-line workers who provide services that are essential to the smooth running of our society — social workers, nurses, cashiers, cleaners, public transport drivers, etc. — no longer have access to housing in our cities.”

Where’s the money? Experts indicate that there is currently an estimated €57 billion annual EU investment gap for affordable housing. More than three-quarters of mayors who participated in the survey said they’d been forced to compromise between delivering high-quality and affordable housing, ensuring energy standards and increasing the quantity of housing.Nearly half of the mayors surveyed are now urging the EU institutions to do something — anything — to address the devastating housing crisis; half of them want the EU budget to have dedicated allocations for building affordable homes.

Cities taking the lead: While they wait for greater EU support, cities vary in tackling the problem. In Dublin, the city is creating new social housing apartments by adapting and refurbishing vacant office and commercial buildings. Bologna’s Villaggio Gandusio project focuses on renovating building façades to improve energy efficiency and renew existing buildings. In Lodz, the focus is on repairing vacant municipal properties and turning them into residences. Milan has launched a dedicated service to aid essential workers struggling with rents.

Realistic solutions: As we’ve noted in this newsletter, housing isn’t an EU competence — but Brussels can still help. Payre said one thing the EU could do was ensure that state aid rules support non-speculative social and affordable housing. Other ideas include a dedicated fund for affordable housebuilding and the energy-efficient renovation of existing public and social housing, and tackling the short-term rental problem with new transparency and accountability requirements for investors. Finally, he urged the next Commission to set up a “dedicated Platform on Housing to support partnerships between national, regional and local authorities, and housing providers.”

STATS & THE CITY

STREET SMARTS

We’re back with our weekly cities-related trivia challenge!Francis Jacobs of Dublin was the first to identify Kazanlak as the Bulgarian city not only famous for being one of Europe’s most important producers of rose oil, but also home to a Thracian tomb complex that is a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The Thracian figures are immortalized in a moment of tenderness and equality. | Creative Commons

The 4th century BCE tomb features a domed mural depicting a Thracian couple at a funeral feast grasping each other’s wrists; the woman is memorably included on the Bulgarian 50 stotinki coin.

This week’s challenge:Telephone boxes are becoming an increasingly rare urban feature — but one city is not only preserving them but also painting them in an iconic cream color. As always, the first reader toidentify the citygets a shout-out in next week’s newsletter.

LOCAL LIBRARY

— Culture-sector workers in Leeds say council spending cuts are killing the city’s burgeoning arts scene, the Guardian reports.

—Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis has pledged that the main line of the long-delayed Thessaloniki metro project will be completed by the end of the year, Ekathimerini reports.

— Around 60 flights scheduled to take off from Munich International Airport were canceled on Sunday amid protests spearheaded by the Letzte Generation (Last Generation) group, Welt reports.

THANKS TO:My editorsKelsey HayesandStephan Faris, and producerGiulia Poloni.

POLITICO’s Global Policy Lab is a collaborative journalism project seeking solutions to challenges faced by modern societies in an age of rapid change. Over the coming months we will host a conversation on how to make cities more livable and sustainable.