The Mediterranean Urban Planners Network, reconstituted in 2018 after several years of inactivity, and now supported by AVITEM and Euroméditerranée, aims to bring together the actors of the sustainable Mediterranean city: planners, but also companies, experts, institutional actors and investors in order to gather experiences, expertise, visions, and promote convergence around a Mediterranean conception of urban planning.
For the second consecutive year, the Network met in plenary session on November 25, hosted by the South Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur Region. This year, the Plenary Assembly was organized within the framework of Act III of the Mediterranean of the Future, whose theme was investment in the Mediterranean.
The breakdown of urban plannification
After an opening speech by Mr. Hugues Parant, Director General of Euroméditerranée, the design office all-NEXT Consultants introduced the day with a candid assessment of the breakdown of urban development in the Mediterranean, highlighting a few important points. First of all, the weakness of the urban project and of the project managment (especially by the State), but also the absence of an urban and social vision of the project, a difficult access to strategic land, and the ever more significant search for short-term profitability with, as a consequence, the growing involvement of promoters in the definition of the project.
Investment in the Mediterranean
The French and Tunisian Caisses des Dépôts et Consignations, the European Investment Bank and the French Development Agency were also present at this meeting.
Their various interventions all express, in summary, that all investments are now oriented towards stimulating green innovations. The investment of these donors offers an opportunity to invest over the long term with deferred profitability. This is an investment that is always in a minority, facilitating private financing in the round table of projects.
Investments in territorial development projects in the Mediterranean exist and correspond to a real need. However, they are still quite restrictive today because they are more suited to very large projects.
The 2020 Guidelines of the Mediterranean Network of Planners
The meeting on 25 November started with a straightforward but positive approach that guides the Network’s work towards a common planning vision. The urban developer must be placed in a global construction of the city, at the heart of the design and assembly of the various urban elements.
Four lines of thought were drawn up at its annual meeting on 25 November:
- The strategic function of public procurement and the planner: how is a planning concept established by moving from image to process, often iterative, between opportunities and vision? What governance? How can project management resume its role, in a formalization of partnerships and with management tools? What risk sharing? Optimization of financing, equity, loans, participation, etc.
- From development to urban renewal towards a goal of reducing soil artificialization and sustainable development
- Sustainable development solutions through land management, resource management, development and sustainable Mediterranean building.
- Marketing of the Mediterranean development product: giving back an identity to Mediterranean products and thus mobilizing a network of companies. The economic stakes are high, particularly from the perspective of urban Africa.
Methodology
The Network intends, through the appropriation and development of the above-mentioned themes, to work on the interfaces, processes and time of the project with a view to finding transferable solutions. First of all, the interfaces between institutions, the state, local authorities and developers. Without this link, projects are not supported and will deteriorate over time. Then between donors and project leaders. The role of the Network is to discuss the projects that have succeeded in attracting international funding, and to understand how, why, with what means and processes, through concrete examples of access to funds. Finally, between the developer, the promoters, and the operators.
The 2020 programme
In order to extend the reflections initiated in 2019 and within the framework of the Mediterranean of the future, the Mediterranean Urban Planners Network will meet for at least three workshops in 2020. These meetings will be held in Marseille but also in partner territories.
In free consultation, the presentations of the speakers of this day:
Anne Sinet and Gérard Le Bihan (allNEXT-Consultants): The relationship between investors and urban developers – governance and project management
Richard Curnier (Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations France): The fundamentals of investment in urban development projects. The point of view of institutional investors (1)
Ms Ben Yaghlane (Caisse des Dépôts et Consignations Tunisie): The fundamentals of investment in urban development projects. The point of view of institutional investors (2)
Pierre-Arnaud Barthel (Agence Française de Développement): The fundamentals of investment in urban development projects. The point of view of institutional investors (3)
Souad Farsi (European Investment Bank): The fundamentals of investment in urban development projects. The point of view of institutional investors (4)
Jalel Ben Amor (Société de Promotion du Lac de Tunis): Presentation of the project
Youssef Hayat (Anfa Urbanization and Development Agency): Presentation of the project
Cyprien Younes Butin (CMI-World Bank): Financial innovation: what we learn from urban and territorial projects in the Mediterranean. The CMI-World Bank experience report
Delphine Baldé and Michel Jaouen (Les Ateliers de Cergy) : Original method for a tailor-made project