- Strategic Planning for equitable Territory Development: the case of sustainable water and wastewater infrastructure in northeast Portugal    click here to open paper content1156 kb
by    Danko, Cristina C. & Lourenco, Julia M. | ccdanko@civil.uminho.pt   click here to send an email to the auther(s) of this paper
Short Outline
Selected Portuguese municipalities were ranked according to their urban water and wastewater infrastructure sustainability, providing a starting point for discussing Portugal’s territorial inequalities and strategic programmes for promoting equity.
Abstract
Selected municipalities in northeastern Portugal were ranked according to the state of their water and wastewater infrastructure, one of the many dimensions of urban development. This is an interior region of the country that has long suffered with population decline in favour of the more developed coastal areas, a migration dynamics that is driven by a number of different factors. Coastal areas, cities and towns, particularly the metropolitan areas of Porto and Lisbon, offer more job opportunities and consequently, a better chance of improved life conditions. The uneven distribution of people across the country has carried standing effects on urban growth and development. Having struggled with this phenomenon over the years, Portugal has called on extensive strategic programmes aimed at protecting and assisting the more deprived interior, offering the possibility of a more equitable territorial model for development and well-being. These include the Portuguese National Strategy for Sustainable Development for 2015 (ENDS 2015) that was approved in 2007 along with its corresponding Plan of Implementation (PIENDS). The strategy focuses on steering the country’s development processes according to sustainability guidelines, while vying for the participation of citizens and a variety of economic and social agents. Akin to the European Union Sustainable Development Strategy in objectives and form, ENDS 2015 aims towards a sustainable growth path and is complemented by a series of other strategies, programmes and plans, including the Portuguese Programme of the Policies for Land-Use Planning (PNPOT), which establishes numerous objectives regarding strategic options encompassing all dimensions of sustainable development. These include territorial equity concerning the endowment of infrastructures, namely for water supply and wastewater collection and treatment, and their management from a social co-responsibility standpoint.
Keywords
Portugal; urban infrastructure; strategic programmes;
Case Study presented on the ISOCARP Congress 2008: Urban Growth without Sprawl
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