City strategy: The future lives in Vantaa

The city’s values are a common understanding of what we regard as important and valuable. They dictate the city’s decision-making and the operations of the entire organization.

Openness means that the city’s decision-making and our entire operational culture is transparent. We are a forerunner in openness. We listen, face, and share information. We are an international city. We are committed to talking with the surrounding society.

Courage is the bravery to act as a trendsetter for the future and learn from best practices. We adhere to the culture of testing where we act without prejudice and challenge established procedures. We search for solutions and engage in dialogue with all actors.

Sustainability means securing the conditions for a good life for the present and future generations. Preparation and decision-making account for ecological, social, financial, and cultural perspectives.

Sense of community entails participation, creating trust and community spirit, as well as commitment to common goals. Residents, businesses, communities, and employees together form a strong community and are good partners to each other. 

In its operations, Vantaa is committed to equality and non-discrimination, as well as to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Vantaa is a bilingual, international city. 

Vantaa is the hometown of the good life to all Vantaa residents

• We give children and the young solid tools for life
• We bolster the sense of community
• We increase the coziness of city centers
• We enhance safety
• We recognize the elderly as a resource.

We ensure that children and the young have diverse opportunities to find their own strengths through guided hobbies, culture, sports, and many other activities. We listen to and hear children and young people especially carefully.

We invest in ensuring that all of our residents’ everyday lives are smooth and active. We commit the residents to the city with the help of easy-to-access cultural and sports services, as well as through the communities arising from them. We improve the equality, non-discrimination, and accessibility of our activities.

We make our city centers clean and active places for enjoyment. We create preconditions for the functioning of the residents’ everyday lives, business activities, events, and improve the comfort of station areas, in particular.

We strengthen both security and the sense of security by providing shared experiences and meaningful activities to people. We develop the city’s overall security thinking and crisis resistance.  

Objectives

1. We enhance the sense of community.

2. We improve Vantaa residents’ sense of safety.

3. All children have a hobby  where they can learn and interact together with others.

4. We enhance the vitality of city centers.

5. We are enhancing Vantaa’s pleasantness.

Read more about the important goals, the baseline levels of the objectives, and the indicators in the PDF version of Vantaa’s city strategy.

Transformational and vibrant Vantaa attracts people and businesses

• We attract talent and businesses.
• We are distinguished as a forerunner in education.
• We diversify housing options.
• We inspire with new kinds of experiences.

We ensure that it is increasingly easy for experts and businesses to come to Vantaa and grow here. We are in constant contact with businesses and the business sector. We especially focus on businesses that create jobs for Vantaa residents, as well as on businesses that attract experts from even far away and strengthen our position as a workplace area with highly skilled employees.

One of our competitive advantages is our easy-to-access location, which we want to further bolster. One of our joint goals is that the metropolitan area as a whole can sustainably rely on public transport. Likewise, we improve the conditions for walking and cycling.

We develop education and training to meet the needs of the future. In particular, we invest in strengthening literacy at all educational levels. Our early childhood education and care units and educational institutions provide equally good and safe environments for growing and learning throughout the city. We ensure comprehensive and strong basic skills for all our students and, furthermore, also ensure excellent skills for further studies and working life.

We offer myriad housing options. We manage housing production in a balanced manner, so that everybody can find a home in Vantaa to suit all their life situations. Urban living is combined with green, cozy housing areas dominated by small houses, as well as valuable local nature. We will build cozy townhouses along the route of Vantaa light rail.

We are building Vantaa of myriad experiences into a unique and striking alternative for various events. Vantaa boosts its status as a national and international city of events. We actively search for new events and utilize the networks concerned.  

Objectives

6. We strengthen Vantaa’s attractiveness as an experiential destination.

7. The number of hiring businesses increases.

8. We diversify our housing provision and forms of ownership.

9. We will increase urban greenness and the accessibility of local nature.

10. Basic skills will strengthen, and learning outcomes will improve in early childhood education, basic education, and upper secondary education.  

Read more about the important goals, the baseline levels of the objectives, and the indicators in the PDF version of Vantaa’s city strategy. 

Vantaa grows ecologically, socially, culturally, and economically sustainably

• We will stop regional differentiation
• We will ensure integration
• We will increase employment and the educational level
• We will protect and strengthen diverse  nature and ensure a climate-resilient future,

We will ensure sufficient services throughout Vantaa. In steering growth and investments, we will examine each major region as their own whole. Our aim is for the regions’ attractiveness to grow and regional differentiation to stop. We will especially strengthen positive development in areas with a lot of social unease.

We are committed to taking care of nature and doing more good than harm to nature. We will protect local forests and other important natural sites. We will take an ambitious approach to preserving biodiversity and ensure our ecological sustainability through actions that support the climate, circular economy and environmentally friendly everyday life. We will prepare for the impacts of climate change.

The integration of residents is a critical factor in all services. We will offer integration services as a single entity, accessibly and at the right time. We will ensure Finnish or Swedish language proficiency for people of all backgrounds so that they can access education and work and become part of the Vantaa community.  

We will raise the education level so that all Vantaa residents have at least an upper secondary education and sufficient competence for further education or working life. We will increase the proportion of residents who have a higher education degree.

We will improve employment by understanding the area’s labor market and supporting the needs of job seekers and employers. Our aim is to strengthen competence and facilitate access to work for all Vantaa residents. We will invest in continuous learning, training and retraining in cooperation with educational institutions, companies and employment services.

We will promote entrepreneurship and offer support for starting a business. We will support young people’s opportunities for education, apprenticeship and employment paths as well as entrepreneurship individually. We will pay particular attention to young people who are not in work, education or training.

Objectives

11. We will raise employment rate.

12. We will raise the educational level.

13. We will succeed in integration.

14. Upper secondary students get into further education or working life.

15. We will stop regional segregation development.

16. We will reduce greenhouse gasemissions.

17. We will be nature-positive by 2030.

Read more about the important goals, the baseline levels of the objectives, and the indicators in the PDF version of Vantaa’s city strategy.

Our strategic project is the light-rail city. Vantaa will become the fourth light-rail city in Finland when building Vantaa light rail is completed, which will happen during this strategy period. The areas surrounding the light-rail route in Hakunila, Tikkurila, and Aviapolis will be significant growth trends in the coming decades in terms of jobs, services, and housing. The light rail will increase Vantaa’s attractiveness: a high-quality and accessible public transport connection will renew the streetscape and make everyday life smooth. With our diverse housing and service provision, we will attract new residents along the route, in the vicinity of jobs. We will make sure that residents can participate in various ways in the story of the light-rail city throughout the journey

Our main goal is that Vantaa light rail will be completed in 2029, and the light-rail city along it will develop.

Read more about the important goals, the baseline levels of the objectives, and the indicators in the PDF version of Vantaa’s city strategy. 

We will balance our economy and invest in the future

• We will balance the operational economy
• We will increase revenues
• We will guide the growth of the city in a controlled manner
• We will stop indebtedness.

Only through a strong economy can we achieve our important goals, that is, continuing to ensure the wellbeing of the residents, the attractiveness of the city and balanced and controlled growth.

In the financing of services, we will take into account the growth of the population and costs. We will especially invest in education and learning, which will also build the foundation for our future. At the same time, however, we will balance our operational economy during the strategy period. We will keep the growth of expenses moderate, review the structure of revenues and expenses, and carry out productivity measures. We will utilize digitalization, automation and artificial intelligence. We will seek savings in procurements and the use of facilities.

We will focus on increasing Vantaa’s vitality and revenue base. We will also actively seek and utilize outside financing.

We will create and establish an investmentmodel with which we will proactively steer the city’s growth, planning, and new construction.

We will stop the development of indebtedness at the end of the strategy period with the balancing of the operational economy and the completion of the light rail investment.

Objectives

18. The operational economy will be balanced during the strategy period

19. Investments in premises will be prioritized

20. The city’s indebtedness will be stopped at the end of the strategy period.

Read more about the important goals, the baseline levels of the objectives, and the indicators in the PDF version of Vantaa’s city strategy. 

Together we will succeed: Our personnel and other success factors will help us achieve our goals

• We make an impact humanely in our work
• We strengthen our ability to renew and solve
• We dare to stand out
• We operate systematically.

Succeeding in our strategy requires that we build our city together for people and companies. We have identified four success factors that will help us achieve our strategic goals. To strengthen these factors, we will develop the competence of our personnel, well-being at work, leadership and operating culture together. As a guideline for this, we will create shared principles for personnel.

Humaneness is reflected in our work through customer-oriented service, smooth digital solutions and leadership.

As a city, we are constantly renewing and successfully finding solutions to the challenges and opportunities of the operating environment.

We stand out through our uniqueness and build on our strengths. The diversity of our city is our strength.  

We operate systemically. We will solve challenges together across departments and renew our management system to support this. We are able to utilize various local, national and international networks in our operations.

We will anticipate the future so that we can change our operations in a timely manner if necessary. Our comprehensive way of operating will help us see how the strategy’s three important goals all influence each other – and can only be achieved together. We will operate as one city, one Vantaa.