Opinion: municipalities must take leadership on climate matters

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Coincidentally, the Conference on Climate Change (COP 26), considered by many to be the last meeting of opportunity, takes place in the same week as the Quebec municipal elections. If current policies continue, projections point to a global temperature rise from 2.7 to 3.1 degrees Celsius by 2100. Such a scenario could trigger a chain reaction in natural systems with dramatic and highly unpredictable consequences. In this sense, municipalities and local communities are at the forefront of both the fight against climate change and the race against time to adapt to the consequences of this crisis.

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We need to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions now while increasing the resilience of our built, ecological and social systems. These aspects are interrelated: for example, making our building more energy efficient through renovations makes electricity available for transportation and the conversion of heating systems in buildings, and rethinking the use of land and plants. Residential densities reduce car use and protect agricultural lands and ecosystems.

The urgency of the situation calls for exceptional measures. The usual development processes that involve the public, private and community sectors, in isolation or in concert, are too slow and lack coherence.

In our academic context, the Next-Generation Cities Institute was founded at Concordia University, providing us with a framework to pose problems and articulate responses outside of the usual academic modes of operation. The institute aims to facilitate collaboration between researchers and educators from a wide range of backgrounds in order to develop integrated and transdisciplinary approaches.

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At the heart of our approach is the desire to collaborate at all stages with local communities and stakeholders, who are the main “customers”, users or beneficiaries of the fruits of our efforts. This innovative approach aims at greater efficiency and speed of action to develop and deploy knowledge, technologies and practices that respond to the climate emergency with a view to inter- and intra-generational equity and social inclusion.

The nature of the problems and the urgency to tackle them collectively call for such cross-cutting and concerted approaches. Even the best technologies, or public policies, on paper can be useless if they do not reach their recipients. It makes no sense, for example, to build high-cost carbon-neutral housing if its inhabitants depend on the car for travel, or to deploy public transport networks without counteracting urban sprawl. We must aim to maximize the “return on our public, private and community investments” based on environmental, social, economic and cultural criteria.

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Collective mobilization is only possible if a principle of equity prevails with respect to the efforts to be made and the expected derived benefits. Quebec has a long tradition of collective mobilization and cooperation at the local, regional and national levels. This practice extends from the neighborhood and sectoral round tables to the conduct of the General States.

We call on future elected city officials to exercise their leadership as soon as they are elected and use this model, which they know well, to mobilize their community to fight and adapt to climate change. In general, municipalities are already well aware of the environmental impacts associated with their development practices and lifestyles and the threats to their populations, ecosystems, and infrastructure. But here, as elsewhere, progress is being made gradually and too slowly.

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Therefore, we encourage municipalities and local communities to establish local tables on climate change to identify local problems and bring together citizens and organizations of good will to define priorities and an action plan. Governments should facilitate these exercises by dedicating substantial resources and promoting the dissemination and transfer of knowledge and experience, including from educational and research institutions.

We look forward to sharing our experience and mobilizing our students in research and teaching activities as a way to demonstrate good citizenship. We strongly recommend that local communities make use of the resources available in CEGEP and university networks. We are confident that our peers and their students share our commitment to act.

Ursula Eicker is Co-Director and Founder of the Institute of Next Generation Cities at Concordia University. This comment is co-author of a high school classmate researchers Carmela Cucuzzella, Pierre Gauthier, Govind Gopakumar, Meghan Joy, Janis Timm-Bottos, Chun Wang and Erkan Yonder.