Renaturing the city: factors contributing to upscaling green schoolyards in Amsterdam and The Hague

Abstract To increase urban climate resilience, the renaturing of cities plays an important role. One strategy is the greening of schoolyards to increase climate resilience and bring additional benefits such as nature education and a healthy environment. While these are small projects, they could make a significant impact if they can be upscaled. With the intent of identifying the local barriers to the upscaling of green schoolyards, this research applies an upscaling framework to analyze and compare two initiatives that incentivize the greening of schoolyards by providing funds to local schools in Amsterdam and The Hague. There is not one barrier but a combination that seems to prevent upscaling, so it is a combination of factors that prevents the successful up-taking of green schoolyards: lack of environmental awareness, difficulties in acquiring monetary funds, lack of time and expertise from the demand-side, complexity of the bureaucratic processes, and lack of political will.