Section 1

Document Organization

These environmental sustainability guidelines are presented in a website and module format in four parts:

 

These sections are summarized below. A separate tab provides access to detailed outlines of each module.

PART 1: MAIN DOCUMENT

Environmental Baseline of Ukraine

Pre-War Environmental Conditions as indicated by Ukraine’s progress in meeting the challenge of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), followed by an outline of the environmental impacts of the war

Laws and Institutions Relevant to Urban and Territorial Planning

Ukrainian planning laws, regulations, and institutions, including legislative framework and spatial planning system, as well as EU Directives on environment and energy

International Aid to Ukraine for Urban and Territorial Planning

Focusing on German, US, and UNDP development assistance programs supporting urban and territorial planning in Ukraine

 

UN-Habitat International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning

Overview and analysis of the Guidelines’ recommendations, focusing on those relating to environmental Sustainability, and cross-walking those recommendations against the SDGs, the environmental impacts of the war, and the EU Directives

 

PART 2: PLANNING FOR THE REGENERATIVE CITY – THE OVERARCHING HOLISTIC APPROACH

NOTE: Part 2 is separate from this main document, but can also be found on the URAG website at URAG.com.

Author: Scott T. Edmondson, AICP, ISSP-SA, Sr. Planner-Analyst & Growth Policy Analysis Modernization Lead, Data Analytics Group, Administration, San Francisco Planning, and Principal/Founder of Sustainability 2030 (www.sustainability2030.com)

Contributor: Charles M. Kelley Jr., AIA, NCARB, LEED AP BD+C, Principal, Green Urban Design

 

Best Approach Practice No. 1:  Change the approach to sustainability planning quickly enough for success using performance imperatives, continuous innovation, a strategic approach, and whole systems engineering.

Best Approach Practice No. 2:  Use Regenerative Urbanism to create a regenerative built environment of the abundant regenerative sustainability economy and regenerative city (and region).

Best Approach Practice No. 3:  “Harden” socio-economic systems for the period of climate system recalibration if mitigation is successful or not.

Best Approach Practice No. 4:  Restore damaged nature in the context of new nature arising from accelerating climate change and associated ecosystem changes.

Best Approach Practice No. 5:  Work across the system, as necessary.

Best Approach Practice No. 6:  Plan and design for the new context of accelerating climate change, unsustainability, and new nature.

Best Approach Practice No. 7:  Harness the market and legal system to reverse climate change and unsustainability and accelerate the transition to an abundant regenerative ecological economy.

Best Approach Practice No. 8:  Continuously innovate to needed systems performance.

Best Approach Practice No. 9:  Design new governance patterns and forms that are required to generate the decision-making intelligence needed for regenerative systems sustainability success.

Best Approach Practice No. 10:  Use full-cost decisions, funding, and 10-year budgeting to fix the broken system of public finance.

 

PART 3:  ENVIRONMENTAL SUSTAINABILITY PLANNING MODULES

NOTE: Part 3 is separate from this main document, but can also be found on the URAG website at URAG.com.

 

Aligning with UN-Habitat IGUTP Section B3. Urban and Territorial Planning and the Environment, 14. Local Authorities

 

MODULE 1: PLANNING SYSTEMS FOR HAZARD MITIGATION AND DISASTER AND INFRASTRUCTURE RESILIENCE

Author: Ipshita Karmakar, Masters of City Planning, MIT,  Fulbright Scholar, Member of International Division of American Planning Association, and Consultant to World Bank

Contributors:

(a) Create climate mitigative, adaptative, and resilient settlement patterns. Formulate urban and territorial plans as a mitigation and adaptation framework in response to climate change and for increasing the resilience of human settlements, especially those located in vulnerable and informal areas.

(c) Relocate high-risk built environments to low-risk areas. Locate essential urban services, infrastructure, and residential developments in low-risk areas and resettle, in a participatory and voluntary way people living in high-risk areas to more appropriate locations.

(d) Defensively harden key urban functions to increasingly extreme events and climate conditions. Assess the implications and potential impacts of climate change and prepare for the continuity of key urban functions during disasters or crises.

(i) Integrate sectoral utility services when synergies create higher value. Collaborate with service providers, land developers, and landowners to closely link spatial and sectoral planning and to promote intersectoral coordination and synergies between services such as water, sewerage and sanitation, energy and electricity, telecommunications, and transport.

 

MODULE 2:  INNOVATIVE STRATEGIES FOR EQUITABLE AND LOW-CARBON URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND GREEN BUILDINGS

 

Author: Vatsal Bhatt, Ph.D., Member,  International Division of American Planning Association, and Vice President for Cities and Communities of US Green Building Council

(b) Develop energy-efficient urban forms using renewable energy. Set up and adopt efficient low-carbon urban forms and development patterns as a contribution to improving energy efficiency and increasing the access and use of renewable energy sources.

(g) Preserve and use existing built assets to strengthen social identity when revitalizing areas of decline. Identify and recognize the value of declining built environments with a view to revitalizing them, taking advantage of their assets, and strengthening their social identity.

(j) Promote green buildings. Promote the construction, retrofitting, and management of “green buildings” through incentives and disincentives, and monitor their economic impacts.

MODULE 3: CREATE HIGH-PERFORMING PUBLIC AND GREEN SPACES

 

Author: Scott T. Edmondson, AICP, ISSP-SA, Sr. Planner-Analyst & Growth Policy Analysis Modernization Lead, Data Analytics Group, Administration, San Francisco Planning, and Principal/Founder of Sustainability 2030 (www.sustainability2030.com)

(f) Create high-performing public and green spaces. Apply urban and territorial planning to identify, revitalize, protect, and produce high‑quality public and green spaces with special ecological or heritage value, integrating the contributions of the private sector and civil society organizations into such undertakings, and to avoid the creation of heat islands, protect the local biodiversity and support the creation of multifunctional public green spaces, such as wetlands for rainwater retention and absorption.

 

 

MODULE 4: PLANNING AND MANAGING RIVER BASINS AND WATER RESOURCES

 

Author: Timothy D. Van Epp, FAICP, PP, Team Leader, Ukraine Rebuilding Action Group of the International Division of the American Planning Association, and Managing Director of Eurasia Environmental Associates, LLC

Reviewer: Bill Cesanek, AICP, Chair of the Water  & Planning Network of the American Planning Association, and Senior Infrastructure Planner of CDM Smith

 

(e) Provide water and sanitation services and reduce air pollution. Use urban and territorial planning as an action plan to improve access to water and sanitation services and reduce air pollution and the amount of water wasted.

MODULE 5: PLANNING TO CLEAN UP CONTAMINATION AND MANAGE WASTES

 

Author: Timothy D. Van Epp, FAICP, PP, Team Leader, Ukraine Rebuilding Action Group of the International Division of the American Planning Association, and Managing Director of Eurasia Environmental Associates, LLC

(h) Include waste management in land use planning. Integrate solid and liquid waste management and recycling into spatial planning, including the location of landfills and recycling sites.

MODULE 6: TRANSPORTATION PLANNING BEST PRACTICES

 

Author: Jing Zhang, AICP, LEED-ND, Chair of the International Division of American Planning Association, and Transportation Planner for Morgantown Monongalia Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO) in West Virginia.

(k) Design, manage, and maintain shaded streets for non-motorized and public transportation modes and carbon sequestration. Design streets that encourage walking, the use of non-motorized transport and public transport, and plant trees for shade and carbon dioxide absorption.

 

PART 4: FUTURE ENVIRONMENTAL, SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC MODULES

 

Part 4, under construction, is separate from the main document, but will also be found on the URAG website at URAG.com.

 

Aligning with UN-Habitat IGUTP Section B1. Urban and Territorial Planning and Social Development, 8. Local Authorities; B2. Urban and Territorial Planning for Economic Development; and B3. Urban and Territorial Planning and the Environment, 14. Local Authorities

 

 

PLANNING FOR IMPROVED AIR QUALITY

 

(e) Provide water and sanitation services and reduce air pollution. Use urban and territorial planning as an action plan to improve access to water and sanitation services and reduce air pollution and the amount of water wasted.

 

PLANNING FOR RESILIENT INFRASTRUCTURE

(i) Integrate sectoral utility services when synergies create higher value. Collaborate with service providers, land developers, and landowners to closely link spatial and sectoral planning and to promote intersectoral coordination and synergies between services such as water, sewerage and sanitation, energy and electricity, telecommunications, and transport.

 

CULTURAL HERITAGE PRESERVATION PLANNING

 

(k) Encourage cultural activities, both indoor (museums, theatres, cinemas, concert halls, etc.) and outdoor (street arts, musical parades, etc.), recognizing that the development of urban cultures and respect for social diversity are part of social development and have important spatial dimensions

 

(l) Protect and value the cultural heritage, including traditional settlements and historic districts, religious and historical monuments and sites, archaeological areas, and cultural

landscapes.

 

PLANNING FOR PEOPLES DISADVANTAGED BY THE WAR (PTSD, AMPUTATION, HEARING LOSS, NEUROLOGICAL DISORDERS)

(h) Improve urban safety, particularly for women, youth, the elderly, the disabled, and any vulnerable groups, as a factor of security, justice, and social cohesion