A Materials Bank for Circular Leuven: How to Monitor ‘Messy’ Circular City Transition Projects

Julie Marin, Luc Alaerts and Karel Van Acker
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Julie Marin: OSA Research Group Urbanism & Architecture, Department of Architecture, KU Leuven, Kasteelpark Arenberg 1, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
Luc Alaerts: Department of Materials Engineering, KU Leuven, Kasteelpark Arenberg 44, 3001 Leuven, Belgium
Karel Van Acker: Department of Materials Engineering, KU Leuven, Kasteelpark Arenberg 44, 3001 Leuven, Belgium

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 24, 1-23

Abstract: In recent years, cities have revealed themselves as being prominent actors in the circular economy transition. Besides supporting and initiating urban projects catalyzing circularity, cities are looking for monitoring tools that can make their progress towards circularity visible. Adopting Leuven’s pilot project for a building materials bank as a case study, this paper notes the particular challenges and opportunities in the pilot project to assess its progress and impact, in combination with gathering data for overall circular city monitoring purposes. Firstly, the paper names tensions between the “messy” transition process from policy ambitions to implementation and the question of data and monitoring. Secondly, the paper identifies relevant dimensions and scales to evaluate progress and impacts of a building materials bank, drawing from its development process. Thirdly, it proposes guidelines to monitor and evaluate circular city projects from the bottom up, combining quantitative indicators with guiding questions in a developmental evaluation. The analysis serves a critical reflection, distills lessons learned for projects contributing to circular cities and feeds a few concluding policy recommendations. The case study serves as an example that, in order to move beyond the tensions between circularity monitoring and actual circular city project development, monitoring instruments should simultaneously interact with and feed the circularity transition process. Therefore, dedicated data governance driven by enhanced stakeholder interactions should be inscribed in transition process guidance. Bottom-up projects such as a building materials bank provide opportunities to do this.

Keywords: circular city; transition; Leuven 2030; building materials bank; monitoring; wood flow analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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