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to compensate the reduction by raising charges or introducing new ones, by levying local
taxes or by involving the private sector (public-private partnership and the privatisation of
public services). Although in some countries the national government tries by financial
equalisation to adjust the means given to towns in proportion to their real needs, in many
countries the largest central cities find themselves in the worst financial straits, and thus
seriously hampered in the pursuit of their policy.
Metropolitan authorities, finally, are few and far between in the EU. We have counted 25
of them, of which 10 in France (Urban Communities). Of the others, some coincide with
a higher administrative level, and the remainder have been created on a voluntary basis
and have hardly any authority at all. In Italy and Portugal the law provides for the
formation of metropolitan administrations, but no great progress has been made with the
implementation. In the Netherlands, plans for ’city provinces’ have been delayed. In the
other countries, ’urban management on the proper level’ does not seem to have any
political priority as yet.
It is difficult to separate the national perception of and priority to urban issues and
challenges from the similarities and differences in the national spatial-development
pattern and the administrative and financial framework. In countries where much
authority is vested in the local government, the national government will intervene less
explicitly in the debate and give less attention to details. But in all countries where
urbanisation started early, the typical metropolitan problems have been high on the
agenda for quite some time. Increasingly, the same problems confront countries that were
late urbanisers. In the strongly urbanised Netherlands, for instance, the predicaments of
cities are getting full attention, but also in countries where the urbanisation degree is still
below the European average (such as Portugal and Finland) the way things are developing
is seen as a threat. Sustainable urban development has become a primary concern
wherever a balance has to be struck between the economy, transport and the environment.
The accents vary among the member states: while Portugal and Greece and to a lesser
degree Spain and Italy give priority to the adjustment and expansion of urban
infrastructure in response to their poorly coordinated urbanisation, Germany, Denmark,
the Netherlands and the other Scandinavian countries are more inclined to relate
accessibility to the environment. Dependent on the spatial development but also, and
especially so, on the administrative and financial organisation, the approach to urban
problems is increasingly a matter of government concern.
In the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and France, urbanisation and the related social
problems have given rise to an area-oriented, more or less integral policy, targeted
explicitly to the towns and cities. In Ireland as well, an explicit national urban renewal
policy has been adopted. In some countries where the urbanisation pattern might also
have given rise to such an explicit national urban policy, the lack of it can be explained by
the specific administrative situation (Germany, Belgium, Austria and less so, Spain) or
the spatial conditions (the relation between Copenhagen and the rest of Denmark, and the
city of Luxembourg within the Grand-Duchy). In some less-urbanised, non-federal states
(Portugal, Italy, Sweden, Greece and Finland), policy attention for urban development is
on the wax. The observation is in order, however, that in all member states, even those