Helsinki, Finland (2024)

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Candidate Overview

Helsinki is the capital of Finland, with a population of 682,000 people, and is the country’s most significant centre for politics, education, finance, culture, and research.

The city owes its character to the sea. By 1809 the city began to develop, Carl Ludvig Engel having provided a neoclassical city plan, and adherence to mainly a low rise city with a human scale has continued throughout the centuries.

The City Council has always adhered to socially minded policies with public participation as a corner stone. Housing provision has concentrated on family housing and community facilities so has tackled the fundamentals of social problems at source. Housing production is the key factor in the success of this policy, having no housing shortage.

Helsinki is a place of growth and is developed as an attractive location to increase Helsinki’s economic activity. Various global indicators rank Helsinki at number one for the best business environment.

In Helsinki, the goals of health and welfare are to improve the well-being, health and safety of the city residents. Oodi, Helsinki’s Central Library, is example of such a holistic approach to community health & wellbeing, where all citizens can do many things and take initiative in what they want to do with 21st century technologies.

Helsinki is well on its way to achieving the goal of carbon neutrality by around 2030, having implemented very efficiently its transport and energy strategies. Similarly, ‘Helsinki Vision Plan 2050’ is fully based on a seamless integration of all transport options with car transport playing a small role, which with currently 78% public transport usage in operation is clearly achievable.

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Thumbnail illustration of Helsinki by David Rudlin AoU, Artist-in-Residence