US cities, by comparison, do well in Profit scores, but have only started to focus their plans on People and Planet actions relatively recently.” Frankfurt, for example, has been championing the cause since 1990 when it created its own energy agency and became a founding member of the Climate Alliance of European Cities. “The key reason is that sustainability has been firmly on the agenda for a far longer period of time in Europe than in many in other parts of the world. “Of the top ten, seven cities were from Europe,” added Batten. Meanwhile two German cities, Frankfurt and Berlin, lead the way on Planet factors, scoring particularly well for waste management and low levels of air pollution. Rotterdam tops the People sub-index due to broad success including high literacy and a good work-life balance. Frankfurt also takes first place on the Profit sub-index, just ahead of the UK’s capital city. Frankfurt leads the world, followed by London, Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Well-established European cities come top of the overall rankings, taking seven of the first ten places.

“As our world becomes increasingly more reliant on its urban centres, it is our hope that city leaders find the Index to be a valuable tool in assessing their priorities and pathways to urban sustainability for the good of all.” “The purpose of our index is to indicate areas of opportunity as cities continue to make progress on their missions to become more sustainable economically, environmentally and for the good of their inhabitants,” John Batten, Global Cities Director at ARCADIS, told Cities Today. The Index, which was conducted by the Center for Economics and Business Research, explores the three demands of social (People), environmental (Planet) and economic (Profit) to develop an indicative ranking of 50 of the world’s leading cities. ARCADIS, a natural and built asset design and consultancy firm, has launched the inaugural Sustainable Cities Index, which seeks to bring together many data points into one place and take a more rounded view of what makes a city sustainable.

Global sustainable cities rankings