Important conditions for Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) to be effective, in the spirit of Directive 2001/42/EC which rules over it, are its cooperative and inclusive attitudes. Cooperation should involve institutions, planning authorities and agencies who are involved in environmental assessment procedures. Inclusion implies favoring and catalyzing local communities’ participation, that is participation of the public, in the planning/assessment process. In Italy, the implementation of the Directive, based on the Law enacted by decree No. 2006/152, should be particularly careful, with reference to the assessment conceptual approach, to the general planning/assessment objectives, which have to be inclusive and incremental, and to participation of the process key-actors, which has to be effective and easy, in terms of its ex-ante and ongoing steps. The regional government of Sardinia (an island of about 24,000 km2 and 1,6 million inhabitants, located west of the Italian mainland near the French island of Corsica), issued a Guidelines Manual (Regione Autonoma della Sardegna 2010) which not only ensures formally that an inclusive and incremental SEA process is implemented, but also defines rigorously the steps a SEA proceeding authority, that is a Sardinian city or a province, has to take in order to favor participation of all potentially-interested subjects, were they public agencies, profit and non-profit enterprises, social and non-governmental organizations, or citizens, and speed-up plan approval and its formal establishment, which take place once the ex-ante SEA process is over. Unfortunately, the application of the GL is still far from being effective. According to the 2006 Environmental Report of the SEA of the Local Transport Plan issued by the Torbay Council (2006; Devon, South-West England), “The goal of sustainable development is to enable people to satisfy their needs and enjoy a better quality of life without compromising the ability of future generations to satisfy their needs. Strategic Environmental Assessment assists in promoting sustainable development by integrating sustainability considerations into the plan making process” (p. 8). This approach is consistent: i. with the United Kingdom’s strategy for sustainable development, Building a Better Quality of Life (UK Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions 2000), which defines four main objectives for the implementation of sustainable development: social progress which recognizes the needs of everyone; effective protection of the environment; prudent use of natural resources; maintenance of high and stable levels of economic growth and employment; ii. with UK Statutory Instrument 2004 No. 1633, “The Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes Regulations 2004,” which implement Directive 2001/42/EC of the European Parliament and Council on the assessment of the effects of certain plans and programmes on the environment (the “Directive”), as regards plans and programmes relating solely to any part of England; iii. with the following documents of the British government: The Strategic Environmental Assessment: Guidance for Planning Authorities (UK ODPM 2003); A Draft Practical Guide to the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive (UK ODPM 2004); A Practical Guide to the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive (UK ODPM 2005); Strategic Environmental Assessment Guidance for Transport Plans and Programmes (UK Department for Transport 2004). This paper discusses crucial points of SEA through a comparison of two case studies concerning these practices , and puts in evidence good lessons that UK and Italy may eventually learn from them. The two case studies concern the SEA of the Local Transport Plan 2006 of the Torbay Council (2006; “LTPT”) and of the Masterplan of the Port of the City of Cagliari (Autorità Portuale di Cagliari 2010; Sardinia, Italy; “MPPC”). The urban contexts of Torbay and Cagliari are shortly described in the following section, and the choice of these cities for the discussion developed in this paper is motivated. The comparison concerns three aspects: i. the relationship between SEA and plan (LTPT, MPPC) with respect to endogeneity of SEA, sustainability, and participation, which is analyzed in the third section; ii. the question of the definition of planning alternative options and the monitoring process, examined in the fourth section. In the conclusion, fundamental differences between the SEA’s of the LTPT and the MPPC are put in evidence and discussed. Since the former was born and defined before the SEA process started, and the latter ran by and large parallel to its SEA, SEA was fairly useless for the MPPC while it was very effective to generate a qualitative improvement of the LTPT.

A comparative analysis of Strategic environmental assessment of two Urban plans: Torbay, United Kingdom, and Cagliari, Italy

ZOPPI, CORRADO
2012-01-01

Abstract

Important conditions for Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) to be effective, in the spirit of Directive 2001/42/EC which rules over it, are its cooperative and inclusive attitudes. Cooperation should involve institutions, planning authorities and agencies who are involved in environmental assessment procedures. Inclusion implies favoring and catalyzing local communities’ participation, that is participation of the public, in the planning/assessment process. In Italy, the implementation of the Directive, based on the Law enacted by decree No. 2006/152, should be particularly careful, with reference to the assessment conceptual approach, to the general planning/assessment objectives, which have to be inclusive and incremental, and to participation of the process key-actors, which has to be effective and easy, in terms of its ex-ante and ongoing steps. The regional government of Sardinia (an island of about 24,000 km2 and 1,6 million inhabitants, located west of the Italian mainland near the French island of Corsica), issued a Guidelines Manual (Regione Autonoma della Sardegna 2010) which not only ensures formally that an inclusive and incremental SEA process is implemented, but also defines rigorously the steps a SEA proceeding authority, that is a Sardinian city or a province, has to take in order to favor participation of all potentially-interested subjects, were they public agencies, profit and non-profit enterprises, social and non-governmental organizations, or citizens, and speed-up plan approval and its formal establishment, which take place once the ex-ante SEA process is over. Unfortunately, the application of the GL is still far from being effective. According to the 2006 Environmental Report of the SEA of the Local Transport Plan issued by the Torbay Council (2006; Devon, South-West England), “The goal of sustainable development is to enable people to satisfy their needs and enjoy a better quality of life without compromising the ability of future generations to satisfy their needs. Strategic Environmental Assessment assists in promoting sustainable development by integrating sustainability considerations into the plan making process” (p. 8). This approach is consistent: i. with the United Kingdom’s strategy for sustainable development, Building a Better Quality of Life (UK Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions 2000), which defines four main objectives for the implementation of sustainable development: social progress which recognizes the needs of everyone; effective protection of the environment; prudent use of natural resources; maintenance of high and stable levels of economic growth and employment; ii. with UK Statutory Instrument 2004 No. 1633, “The Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes Regulations 2004,” which implement Directive 2001/42/EC of the European Parliament and Council on the assessment of the effects of certain plans and programmes on the environment (the “Directive”), as regards plans and programmes relating solely to any part of England; iii. with the following documents of the British government: The Strategic Environmental Assessment: Guidance for Planning Authorities (UK ODPM 2003); A Draft Practical Guide to the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive (UK ODPM 2004); A Practical Guide to the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive (UK ODPM 2005); Strategic Environmental Assessment Guidance for Transport Plans and Programmes (UK Department for Transport 2004). This paper discusses crucial points of SEA through a comparison of two case studies concerning these practices , and puts in evidence good lessons that UK and Italy may eventually learn from them. The two case studies concern the SEA of the Local Transport Plan 2006 of the Torbay Council (2006; “LTPT”) and of the Masterplan of the Port of the City of Cagliari (Autorità Portuale di Cagliari 2010; Sardinia, Italy; “MPPC”). The urban contexts of Torbay and Cagliari are shortly described in the following section, and the choice of these cities for the discussion developed in this paper is motivated. The comparison concerns three aspects: i. the relationship between SEA and plan (LTPT, MPPC) with respect to endogeneity of SEA, sustainability, and participation, which is analyzed in the third section; ii. the question of the definition of planning alternative options and the monitoring process, examined in the fourth section. In the conclusion, fundamental differences between the SEA’s of the LTPT and the MPPC are put in evidence and discussed. Since the former was born and defined before the SEA process started, and the latter ran by and large parallel to its SEA, SEA was fairly useless for the MPPC while it was very effective to generate a qualitative improvement of the LTPT.
2012
9781620811146
Strategic Environmental Assessment; City planning; Environmental planning; Sustainability and city planning
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11584/44939
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