On Tuesday, April 1st, the Executive Board of the Province of Gelderland visited the municipality of Ede. The newly appointed Kings Commissioner Daniel Wigboldus and the deputies were welcomed at the WFC site to discuss housing developments in Ede and cooperation with the province.

Ede is a growing municipality and ranks in the top 15 municipalities in the Netherlands where new homes are being built. This is much needed given the significant housing shortage in Ede. There is extensive collaboration with the region and the province, for example, in the area of the Housing Deal. In addition to building sufficient houses, there are many economic developments in Ede. In the vicinity of the recently renovated Ede-Wageningen station, work is being done on office locations and space for start-ups and innovative companies. To realize the ambitions, solutions must be found for various challenges, such as nature and environmental permits, potential zoning around Natura 2000 areas, and connection to the power grid. Moreover, a growing municipality must remain accessible to residents living there and people working in the municipality. Good public transport facilities and investments in mobility are necessary for this.

The plans in Ede have many intersections with provincial policy: for example, in the area of spatial planning, economic developments, and nature restoration. Good cooperation with the province is necessary to implement plans. Arnold Versteeg (deputy mayor) looks back on a good meeting: ‘in many areas, we work well with the province and we want to tackle the bottlenecks together. This administrative consultation was very useful for that. The province and the municipality of Ede will work on further ambitions in the field of housing, economic developments, and nature restoration in the coming years.’