Achievements - Connect Wageningen

Achievements 2018-2022

Four years in the council and four years of changing Wageningen. Action instead of just words. You can find what we have achieved on this page.

Passing the baton to younger people

The city council was in turmoil after Connect Wageningen joined in 2018. Other political parties were confronted with the fact that they almost had no active young people. As a response they started to actively search for them as well. We count that as an indirect result of Connect Wageningen. Furthermore, it turned out to be much harder to talk about young people, with young people. So, us joining the city council required some getting used to. But in the end, Wageningen is the better for it!

Increase of young people in the city council

Bigger role for students in policy

Consequences for the future are consequences for us, so we added more long-term perspective

We got a very young mayor in Wageningen

Connecting

Connect promised 4 years ago to improve the accessibility of Wageningen, we succeeded.

Bicycle tunnel at the Bornsesteeg/ Nijenoordallee

Four years ago, they were calling us naive, they said it was impossible or too expensive. However, our vision is now becoming reality. We will get a tunnel at Bornsesteeg/ Nijenoordallee. Here you can see how that will look (from 02:30).

Night bus Utrecht

During nighttime, a bus is driving between Wageningen and Utrecht. This is thanks to a motion of Connect Wageningen and thanks to the student union S.A.W. The bus is only driving on specific days and not during corona, however this is the first step to ‘connect’ Wageningen to the public transportation night net!

Bicycle highway in Wageningen

Wageningen has become safer and safer over these past years. Three out of the six crossroads and roundabouts from our 2018 spearheads have been upgraded. Besides that, as we speak the bicycle highways to Ede and Arnhem are being constructed. And finally, the route between Haarweg and campus was restored. Yay!

Welcome in Wageningen package

For the last four years we have been trying to implement a welcoming package for new citizens. We finally succeeded and new citizens receive a package with free items and gift cards, which they can spent in our city centre. This will increase the traction to the city centre and will keep Wageningen fun, entertaining and ‘gezellig’. A second goal is that citizens register as a citizen in the municipality, so that we will receive more money from the state government.

Housing in Wageningen

This was one of our most important dossiers. Models of the population growth were consistently underestimating the actual growth of Wageningen. And numbers that are published are being played with. As an example, students are now evicted after 3 or 6 months after they finish their studies. Consequently, they must move out of their student room, often to their parents and thus register in the new municipality. Therefore, they are not visible in the housing shortage of Wageningen anymore. Since our start in 2018 we have time and time again asked attention for the housing crisis and insisted on urgency.

We supported plans for housing and took away hurdles

Push developers to build high layered buildings

Fight the rules about limiting the 5% room renting per street

Push the sharing of houses

We voted against the budget cuts on housing

Inclusive society

Show off your projects, features, or clients in this section.

Depressions, burn-outs and stress

We put this subject on the agenda, then we put it on the agenda again and then we put it on the agenda again. This is what we did and will keep doing. It’s a very important topic and Corona came on top of that. We also had a motion to ask the mayor to spread anti-stress talking jars over the city centre. In another motion we included this topic and work joy in the goals of the economic plan of Foodvalley.

Communication in English

We managed to get the municipality to communicate better in English. Originally non-Dutch reading people were unable to find information in the news or on the website. Nowadays the municipality is working on a new website, where important news and essential information is available in English. Welcome in 2022.

Push for an international school in Kortenoord

When we polled international communities in Wageningen to estimate demand for an international school we concluded that there is demand. So, we have been trying to get an international school in Wageningen. However, we have been unsuccessful to put this on the agenda successfully. For now, the closest international school is in Arnhem.

Free bicycle light events

Every year everybody without good lighting on their bicycle lights can get new ones from us! We organise that event together with other young people organisations and the municipality, so that everybody is visible in the dark. We hope to reduce the traffic accidents and improve your safety on the bicycle!

Green city

Since the national climate agreement was signed, there is happening a lot in municipalities and regions. The regional energy strategy Foodvalley was written, and every municipality needs to make a warmth-transition-vision. We looked at possibilities for green energy production in the region and for improving energy labels and reducing CO2 emissions within the municipality. Connect Wageningen was not sitting still and actively contributing.

Our motion ‘multifunctional solar parks’ called the university to action to study the effects of solar parks on biodiversity.

We were commissioners for student studies (ACT projects) in participation of young people in climate policies. And gained insights in how we can use that to improve upon climate policy.

Our idea about assigning a city ecologist was implemented in the coalition agreement. Since we are an opposition party, we are proud of this.

In the developments of the Grebbedijk, recreation was originally not a goal. We changed this.

We changed the way we want developers to think. When developing in the region Arnhem-Nijmegen-Foodvalley we want developers to start with goals from energy transition.

One world week

We organised a meeting with the mayor and the city councillors during One world week. This is a very easy way to get in touch with local politics for students and internationals in Wageningen.

Housing

A roof for everybody

Accessibility

Travelling faster in and out of Wageningen

Integration

Together in Wageningen

Circular Economy

Investing in climate knowledge

Education

A life of learning

Safety

Safe in and around Wageningen

Culture

More culture for a livable city

Health

Caring for eachother

Sport

Sports for a healthy and social society

Green City

A green and sustainable city

The brand 'Wageningen'

Wageningen visibility

Finances

Financial feasibility

Contact