Sustainability in Cities and The Example of European Green Capitals

Sustainable practices are needed in cities so that people can live in cities where negative environmental conditions are reduced, which improves their health and quality of life. An important factor for the sustainability of cities is the European Green Capitals criteria. These criteria include the city's climate change, air pollution, agriculture, natural disasters and risk factors, solid waste management, ecological and economic development goals. In this study, it is aimed to examine the prominent effects of sustainable planning and design in cities and the European Green Capitals that have not yet been defined in our country. Very few studies have been conducted on the European Green Capital issue in our country, and the cities that received the green capital award are very little known. For this purpose, the green capital concept and Stockholm (2010), Hamburg (2011), VitoriaGasteiz (2012), Nantes (2013), Copenhagen (2014), Bristol (2015), Ljubljana (2016), Essen (2017), Nijmegen (2018), Norway (2019), Portugal (2020), Lahti (2021), Grenoble F (2022), Tallin (2023), Valencia (2024) cities were examined. It is thought that European Green Capitals are a concept that will pioneer implementation in our country as well. It is aimed to give this title to future applications.