This series of posts have explored a number of urban issues through a UPE lens, including studying the metabolism of waste and water. Berlin’s aims to configure this metabolism to be as circular as possible shows their strong ambition and forward-thinking outlook to promote sustainability. Although I didn’t explore this idea in the posts, Berlin’s…

The Daily Mail referred to Berlin’s successful approach to tackling the spread of coronavirus by exposing London’s death rate to be 15 times higher than Berlin [1]. Not only does this alarming fact expose the weakness of London’s approach, but it also conveys the effectiveness of Berlin’s responses to the pandemic. It also conveys the…

Berlin is the dirtiest city in Germany in terms of air quality. The height of its particulate matter figures can exceed 20 to 40 times the EU’s maximum thresholds [1]. The realisation of these alarming figures was accelerated by the Dieselgate scandal, which exposed diesel cars as one of the key contributors to the city’s…

Back in the nineteenth century, Berlin was known for its swimming spots along the canals of the River Spree. However, due to sewage overflows during periods of heavy rainfall, the Spree canal is now a stretch of murky water, and anyone who would consider swimming in it would simply put themselves at risk of illness….

In 2019, Berlin announced that public transport will be entirely free for school children and also reduces fares for apprentices [1]. Following the footsteps of Luxemburg, who said earlier this year they would introduce fare free public transport in the city, Berlin are now making incremental progress towards this concept to ensure equal access to…

Following from last week’s blog which looked at Berlin’s smart approach to rainwater management, the same ‘smartness’ can be identified in their waste management strategies. Berlin has one of the most innovate and technologically advanced waste management systems in the world. With Germany’s decision to ban the use of traditional landfill sites in 2005, municipals had…

Despite Germany’s status as the ‘green leader’ of Europe, the capital scored a rather disappointing score of 3.34 out of 10 for environmental protection [1]. Since then, the city has displayed attempts to address climate change and environmental protection against flooding by integrating them within their ‘smart’ approaches. By looking at the newly implemented ‘sponge…

Hello and welcome to my blog exploring the urban political ecology of Berlin. Urban political ecology (UPE) is a broad and diverse discipline that explores cultural, social, political and economic factors in ecological issues. In the context of these blog posts, it is utilised as a lens to address specific urban issues occurring in Berlin….