How can we start using more timber in urban environments to provide sustainable and affordable housing to our citizens?
The second workshop in the Build-in-Wood project, coordinated by Urbasofia and project leader Danish Technological Institute, focused on this key question.
After the in-depth analysis of the contextual city questionnaire and over 15 local stakeholder questionnaires, Urbasofia (as work package leader) developed the concept for Copenhagen’s first Early Adopter City workshop: shedding light on challenges, possibilities and the path for more sustainable urban construction. The city of Copenhagen is the second one in the project to host their workshop.
Altogether about 30 people took part in the workshop (7 attendees in person at DTI headquarters + over 20 attendees digitally via MS Teams). The workshop was divided into various sections, including:
- the presentation of the Build-in-Wood project by Anders Kjellow from DTI
- Catharina Winberg from the city Counsel of Växjö in Sweden speaking about how they managed to achieve a “timber” rate of 48% in 2020 in all new public construction
- Representatives of the City of Copenhagen, explaining current climate initiatives and the city’s goal of achieving climate neutrality by 2025
- Inputs and discussions guided by Sabina Leopa from Urbasofia, open discussion and Q&A
Sabina Leopa addressed a general issue we keep facing regarding acceptance and regulations of timber construction:
“You need a critical mass in order to convince people. But you need to convince people, in order to get a critical mass.”
The official workshop with presentations was followed by an open discussion between:
- Project Coordinator DTI
- By & Havn
- the Danish Transport, Construction and Housing Authority
- KAB Bolig
- the City of Copenhagen
The conclusions will inform the next steps in co-creating a more sustainable, more wood-oriented agenda at local level.
