City cooperation "aboutcities" presents sustainability project

Cities in Lower Saxony are making tourism future-proof –
Sustainability project by the “aboutcities” city partnership successfully completed

Today, representatives of the Lower Saxony city partnership aboutcities presented the results of the sustainability project “17 Cities, 17 Solutions” at the inclusive Anna Leine coffeehouse. The member cities, in collaboration with TourismusMarketing Niedersachsen GmbH (TMN) as part of a state-funded project by the State of Lower Saxony, developed innovative solutions and recommendations for action to make urban tourism more ecological, social, and economic. This resulted in a wide range of detailed project outcomes that can also be adopted by other tourism stakeholders.

All project results are available
online As part of the project, the platform www.nachhaltigkeitskompass-niedersachsen.de was created, where all the measures developed are freely accessible. There, interested tourism stakeholders, businesses, and organizations can find checklists, mission statements, action guides, criteria catalogs, decision-making tools, and best practices for implementing sustainable tourism strategies.

Goals and Measures
About two years ago, the cities participating in the aboutcities partnership set a goal to stabilize tourism, local recreation, and leisure activities over the long term. Thanks in particular to the close collaboration among the 20 member cities, valuable insights have been shared and new ideas developed. This has led to innovative strategies and pragmatic solutions that can be implemented by individual cities as well as by the group as a whole.
A key aspect that also convinced N-Bank and the State of Lower Saxony to fund 80 percent of the project is the open-source concept: All documents created are freely accessible, allowing other cities and regions to adopt and further develop them. In addition, the project seamlessly ties in with the climate impact adaptation project of TourismusMarketing Niedersachsen GmbH (TMN) and complements a long-term, holistic tourism strategy for Lower Saxony. In doing so, it provides important impetus for sustainable urban development and tourism planning beyond the scope of aboutcities.

Board member Petra Rosenbach emphasizes: “With our project ‘17 Cities, 17 Solutions,’ we are sending a strong signal for the future. All of the measures demonstrate how environmental responsibility, social inclusion, and economic sustainability can be integrated into tourism activities—while also benefiting the local population.”
The collaboration among the cities has resulted in 31 measures across nine areas of action, including topics such as urban green spaces, green meetings, service design, a single-use-free city, procurement, and regionality. The cities received technical support from Teejit GmbH in Eichstätt and BTE – Tourismus- und Regionalberatung Partnerschaftsgesellschaft mbB in Hannover.

The Sustainability Compass is regularly updated with current initiatives, new ideas, and best practices, ensuring that the platform continues to grow and establish itself as a central hub for knowledge sharing. The project was funded by the State of Lower Saxony under the Tourism Promotion Guidelines.

For more information about the Lower Saxony city network aboutcities, please visit www.aboutcities.de