Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes: building future-proof regions. Our responsibility for the next generation

Today, cities are home to more than half the world’s population, and an influx of 2.5 billion to these urban centres are expected by 2050. That’s only 30 years from now.

This mass migration is going to put a huge strain on both cities and rural areas: cities will need to rapidly develop resilient infrastructures to absorb the new citizens, while rural areas will need to work hard to retain and attract residents by creating strong, thriving communities.

This issue is something that will directly impact all of us. So we are all responsible for sculpting our regions’ futures to ensure an equal spread of populations, and to make both attractive options to live in.

As part of this effort, the newly formed region of Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes in France has taken steps to co-create an effective and lasting infrastructure for its inhabitants.

The region was created in 2016 following a redrafting of territories in an attempt to consolidate identities and create stronger regions. Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes is now the fourth largest territory in France with 12 million inhabitants, and an incredible diversity of landscape (pristine nature, tiny hamlets and huge cities). This means it suffers from numerous disparities — economically, culturally and socially.

In order to tackle these current disparities, to future-proof the region, and to build a unified identity, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes is mapping their strategic urban planning challenges and targets for the next decade. The identified elements will form the region’s SRADDET (Regional Scheme for Urban planning, Sustainable Development and equality of territories), and projects to better the region will be implemented in 2019.

And as the results of the SRADDET will impact the whole community, the whole community is involved with developing it.

Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes is undertaking extensive on- and offline consultations (through the support of Civocracy) with both their citizens and key stakeholders, in order to source innovative ideas and address concerns.

To date, over 1,000 inhabitants have contributed to discussion on a range of themes, including:

• Landscape preservation
• Harnessing the potential of rivers
• Air pollution
• Innovation and technologies
• The future of commuting
• Promotion of the region
• Economic Development

For example, citizens have produced innovative solutions on the subject of energy production. Some of the most supported ideas include encouraging people to produce their own energy through financial help schemes, providing waste compacting machines in residences, and developing improved insulation regulations for new buildings.

In another consultation, one focused on bettering commuting in the region, a citizen noted there would be a marked improvement if existing infrastructures were more cleverly utilised. They have suggested that seasonally-operational train stations (for ski resorts) are temporarily converted into co-working spaces during summer, thus using spaces more effectively and meaning rural communities would still have access to a running train route.

Ahead of opening the citizen-led discussions, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes hosted 11 meetings with key actors in the spaces of change management, urban planning and sustainable development, in order to responsibly scope the consultation topic areas. Those actors, alongside city and region representatives, included the Social and Economic Council, the Chamber of Commerce and the National Office of Forestry.

These organisations, and other stakeholders, then also had the opportunity to directly add their own contributions to the Civocracy platform. More than 60 entities added their visions and strategy proposals to the SRADDET.

The final public consultation closed at the end of July. Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes will now begin producing a full report, and the resulting projects and policy changes will start being implemented at the beginning of 2019.

As the SRADDET is produced, other consultations, tailored around existing ideas and issues already raised, will be held to deep-dive into specific areas that need development.

There’s already been a positive impact on the region’s community, as the consultations have raised awareness amongst the wider population about the importance of building a future-proof territory.

In collaborating with their population on the project, a number of subjects that didn’t directly fall under the remit of the SRADDET were raised as issues of concern. And on reviewing content, the region took the decision to further develop ideas on these subjects.

One such example is the Natural Reserves Protection Scheme — a topic bound by strict legal processes. For the first time, the region opened a large-scale citizens consultation focused on the preservation of caves that have a large bat population.

This discussion is open until the 15 October 2018: check it out here.

You can view all of the SRADDET discussions here.

Authored by Héloïse Le Masne, Head of Engagement and Client Management

Edited by Emily McDonnell, Head of Partnerships and Communications