Is there no tree or plant in your street? You’re not alone. Despite all kinds of projects by municipalities and residents to make cities greener and more liveable, more and more streets and squares are dominated by concrete and asphalt. Why is it not possible to prevent petrification?
A recent study by consultancy Sweco and environmental organization Natuur& Milieu shows that more than half of Dutch neighborhoods are petrified. A neighborhood is urbanized if it has less than 75 square meters of green space per residential address or is not connected to a green area of at least 1 hectare. Cycle paths, paving and parking spaces are becoming petrified. Sports fields, parks, water and trees are seen as green.
There is no doubt that this petrification has consequences: less greenery means more heat, more flooding during downpours and less healthy living environments, the researchers say. Animals in the city and biodiversity also suffer from the disappearance of plants and trees.
Tilburg: hot stones, less green
The report exposes a worrying trend: throughout Brabant, public green space per home is decreasing. The most in Eindhoven and Tilburg (21 and 19 percent). “The city center of Tilburg in particular is so petrified that it was once declared the hottest city in Europe,” says Tom Daelman, Groen spokesperson for the municipality of Tilburg. “The petrification has to do with our location on sandy soil and our history as a poor textile town. You cannot solve that overnight,” he explains.
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Despite these obstacles, a lot of work is being done towards a greener Tilburg. For example, squares are being redesigned, schoolyards are being made greener and residents are being encouraged to create facade gardens, says Daelman. Despite the efforts, the report shows that the number of green neighborhoods is still decreasing. “That feels illogical,” Daelman admits. “We have come a long way, so we need more time to prevent fossilization. We hope that the results will be better in the next study.”
More people, less green
Not only Tilburg struggles with petrification. According to researchers, the decrease in greenery is probably because more and more houses have to be built. Between 2019 and 2024 alone, 234,000 homes were added nationally, but the greenery did not grow along with the number of inhabitants. “The will is there, you see a lot of initiatives, but the greening is simply too slow, it remains alarming,” says Dieuwertje Penders of Natuur & Milieu, which contributed to the report.
Public green spaces are decreasing in all Brabant cities, but Breda and Den Bosch (9 percent) are doing much better than Tilburg. They reacted cautiously positively to the report. “Our efforts are starting to become visible,” the municipality of Breda said. But for them too, greening is a long-term matter.
The municipality of Eindhoven has not (yet) responded to the questions.
READ ALSO: Tilburg is in the Stone Age: more concrete than green