Erfgoed Deal Leiden

How can future generations continue to enjoy the beautiful city centre of Leiden? How can such a paved and densely built-up historic centre be made greener? The Leiden Heritage Deal aims to ensure the historic city centre is fit for the future. This involves addressing issues such as heat stress and flooding, as well as enhancing biodiversity. Naturalis has developed a toolbox providing an overview of green and 'heritage-inclusive' measures.

Download the report: Historisch hart, groene toekomst (DUTCH) Download the file for optimal use.

Greening with
Heritage Inclusion

We have identified various measures for climate-resilient urban design. How can these measures enhance biodiversity, reduce heat island effects and improve water management? Different locations in the city, such as quays, squares and alleys, have different greening measures to promote urban nature and climate goals while taking the historic character of buildings or neighbourhoods into account. You will find these measures in the toolbox, which is designed for citizens and urban designers alike.

How does the toolbox work?

For each measure, we’ve indicated whether it helps to preserve the historic character of a building, for example. We have also explained how the measure impacts urban nature. We provide guidance for a greener urban design through a few tips and useful resources.

Dialogue with
the Past

In addition to developing the toolbox, Naturalis researcher Marco Roos spoke with historian Fenna IJtsma about historical plantings in Leiden. Together, they investigated which plant species were planted or present in Leiden at the time and whether these plantings are still relevant today.

Read more about the historical research by Fenna IJtsma.

Ultimately, history and biodiversity have been brought together in an image database featuring historical prints, paintings and photographs of urban elements that are important in both historical green space and biodiversity research. For each image, researchers assessed the types of vegetation and/or species visible and their effect on (local) biodiversity.

Explore the image database