Toronto Mayor in Copenhagen

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By Elli Davis, December 21, 2009

copenhagen city hall photo by Pete

Copenhagen was one of the most discussed cities this past week. But not only the UN climate negotiations, the intention of which was to increase international efforts to reduce emissions of all the gases considered responsible for global warming, were taking place in Denmark’s capital. Leaders from approximately 80 top cities of the world, including Toronto, were also discussing interesting topics at the Climate Summit for Mayors at Copenhagen City Hall. The title of their meeting was "Cities Act" and municipal action and intake was showcased there.

Exchanging known-how, ideas and experiences on the faced challenges such as waste management, heating, public transport and promoting solar and wind energy also formed a crucial part of the program. Actually, the Mayor of Toronto David Miller is currently the chairman of C40 Cities Climate Leadership group – a group of the world's biggest cities committed to deal with climate change.

C40 Group is asking the top national leaders to officially recognize the important role of local authorities of the world in the challenge to drive down carbon emissions. In the words of Chairman David Miller, “while nations talk, cities are acting.” Cities are the ones delivering real cuts in greenhouse gases, according to him. They have cut 1 million tons of CO2 per year already.

City leaders apparently really want to help and influence the current situation, but they simply cannot do it all by themselves. To do more and much more efficiently, it’s the turn of national governments to act. Cities are doing what they can possibly do to responsibly undertake the issue of climate change and now Canada along with other states should step up and show leadership at the national and international level. Toronto together with other top places of the world cannot do as much as Canada with other states can. More cooperation is needed between cities and states. Nations, do something!

It seems like not many issues were actually resolved during the negotiations. But Toronto was quite nicely represented in Copenhagen, as our Mayor was the leader of the C40 group. Our city sure is deeply influenced by the topic and the consequences of any important decision would be significantly felt here.

Serious work needs to be done on one of the topics discussed by the mayors – public transportation, that’s for sure. True, the city is now trying to concentrate mainly on that and more than 50 percent of the city budget will be used for public transport. Also, enviro friendly vehicles will soon start being developed in Ontario, close to Toronto. It sure is a big advantage that our Mayor had a chance to hear experiences and know-how of Mayors of other cities where public transport is at a higher level.

Also, heating houses with or generally using solar or wind energy needs to be more spread. It is not suffuciently popular yet, which is not right. Hopefully the mayors together with national leaders will soon figure out how to efficiently deal with these important matters and bring them to the attention of public.