Dialogue actions for the Urban Agenda, Spain

The Urban Agenda for Spain is being defined to ensure maximum utilisation of the growth potential of cities and to successfully tackle social challenges in order to stimulate growth, liveability and innovation in the cities of Spain, promoting cooperation between them. In this scenario specific actions are proposed destined to enlarge the dialogue between Copernicus institutions (e.g. IGN/CNIG Spain) and member states authorities, especially with the Spanish working group on the Urban Agenda (http://rediniciativasurbanas.es/RIU/LANG_CASTELLANO/grupos_trabajo/grupo_agenda_urbana_espana/) in order to promote, look for, encourage and boost the Copernicus data and services. Examples of specific actions can be focused for instance on how Copernicus could monitor urban dynamics (urban growth, urban green areas, land use and its evolution, urban sprawl) in order to assist local and regional authorities. Spanish urban agenda in being defined following guidelines from EU Urban Agenda (https://ec.europa.eu/futurium/en/urban-agenda-eu/what-urban-agenda) and the New Urban Agenda from UN (http://habitat3.org/the-new-urban-agenda/).

During the period 2014-2020, Spanish cities are defining actions – integrated or individually – that will respond to specific problems by acting on the physical, environmental, economic, competitive and social dimension. For these reasons, it is necessary to put into the hands of local authorities (through the Urban Agenda working group) the potential and benefits of Copernicus as a monitoring tool for urban development, and using the feedback of these actions, increasing the knowledge of local users’ needs to improve Copernicus in future.

Such activities may include (always in the framework of the Spanish Urban Agenda):

• Meeting point for local authorities and Copernicus institutions, Workshops and Interviews;
• Setting up and promoting (cross-border, national, sub-national) networks of users, including institutional, commercial and NGO, for a broad stakeholder dialogue;
• Studies to identify further potential application domains to be developed, where user communities and Copernicus stakeholders may not have come together and markets have not yet developed;
• Identifying best practices for setting up authoritative, standard and coordinated mechanisms at the local level that connects to national and European levels.

This is expected to lead to:

• A network of networks for information activities and distribution mechanisms allowing link Copernicus User Forum with Spanish Urban Initiatives Network specially oriented to the definition and development of the Urban Agenda in accordance with EU Urban agenda and New Urban Agenda from UN.
• Promoting the use by national stakeholders related to local and regional urban domains.
• Coordinate requirements between member states to ensure the use of Copernicus in relation to the implementation of the local urban agenda.