F4WM - Fit4WienerMission

Status

completed

Summary

Vienna is the most livable city in the world. Affordable housing, well-developed public transport, easily accessible green spaces, excellent health care, inclusive educational institutions, broad cultural offerings and good opportunities on the labor market contribute to the quality of life in this city. Important components of this quality of life are also the climatic conditions in Vienna, which will demand our commitment and action in the coming years. Depending on the success or failure of global climate protection efforts, temperatures in Vienna will rise to an average of up to 4 degrees by the end of the century. This will no longer be Vienna as we know it.

That is why Vienna's city government has set itself the goal in its 2020-2024 government program of becoming climate neutral by 2040, thus contributing to climate protection on a global level. To achieve this overarching goal, the City of Vienna can build on extensive preparatory work. After all, the city has been pursuing a comprehensive strategic climate policy since the late 1990s with the resolutions of the climate protection programs in the City Council (KliP in 1999 and KliP II in 2009).

The last decades of the city's climate policy testify to countless efforts to pool the extensive knowledge within the administration and to sharpen the common understanding of what we can do for the climate and where we can start. This applies to planning, implementation and monitoring of measures in order to ensure the highest quality. The findings in the fields of climate action and climate adaptation can be found in programmes and strategies of recent years.

Now the course is to be set for the coming years in order to make Vienna a climate-neutral and climate-smart metropolis by 2040. To this end, the key climate action and climate adaptation goals of the City of Vienna were systematically recorded and made tangible in the Smart Climate City Strategy Vienna adopted in 2022. Building on the ambitious objectives, the Vienna Climate Roadmap identifies the measures and instruments to achieve the goals - from mobility to energy, from circular economy to services of general interest. In doing so, Vienna relies on tried and tested measures and instruments, while at the same time breaking new ground.

Parallel to the creation of the Smart Climate City Strategy Vienna and the Vienna Climate Roadmap, the Fit4WienerMission (F4WM) project in 2021/2022 offered the opportunity to deepen knowledge of the upcoming transformation processes and to move closer to implementation in the sense of the two fundamental strategy documents. The focus was on the question of how to involve relevant stakeholders - city-related institutions, research, business, social partners, NGOs and civil society - in the implementation of the systemic transformation.

Following this question, Fit4WienerMission was used especially for networking and community building, as well as for the elaboration of possible new, innovative elements of Vienna's climate policy, always paying special attention to the harmony with the objectives of the Smart Climate City Strategy and the measures from the Climate Roadmap. The results of Fit4WienerMission include the following points:

• Conception of a Climate Citizens' Council (Climate Assembly): A concept for a Climate Citizens' Council was designed on the basis of literature research and the analysis of international examples and coordinated with relevant stakeholders. The idea of the Climate Citizens' Council is to empower citizens not only to participate in the achievement of climate neutrality, but also to have a say in the process.
• Concept for a Climate Alliance: Based on extensive desktop research, a concept for a Climate Alliance was developed. In addition to strategic partnerships between the city and businesses, it includes a voluntary commitment to climate-friendly adaptation of the businesses product range, the creation of green jobs and the realignment of business models.
• A methodology for GHG and energy balancing of districts and an initial version of a manual for climate-neutral Viennese districts which contain basic principles for the implementation of climate-neutral Viennese districts were developed.
• Setting up and supporting an internal city community building: In addition to existing initiatives, the new network "WILMA" for young committed employees of the administration and municipal companies for the climate neutrality of Vienna was launched.
• Application as an Austrian pioneer city: Preparation for the submission for public-public cooperation in fall 2022.

In addition to the work on content, Fit4WienerMission has also helped to foster interdepartmental collaboration. Furthermore, the exchange between the federal government and Austrian cities was strengthened as well as cooperation with other Austrian cities in order to learn with and from each other.

Finally, the ongoing exchange with international and national partners from politics, science, research and development, business and civil society motivates and inspires us to take bold steps together. Through these partnerships the goal of climate neutrality becomes feasible.

Project management

Stadt Wien / MA 20 – Energy Planning

Project or cooperation partners

• Stadt Wien / MA 18 – Urban Development and Urban Planning
• Urban Innovation Vienna GmbH

Stadt Wien / MA 20 - Energieplanung
Sarah Haas
Rathausstraße 14-16, 3. Floor, Room 330
A-1010 Vienna
Tel.: +43 (1) 4000 88316
E-Mail: Sarah.haas@extern.wien.gv.at
Web: energie.wien.gv.at