Strategic Green Infrastructure Planning

This book addresses the nuts and bolts of planning and preserving natural assets at a variety of scales--from dense urban environments to scenic rural landscapes. A practical guide to creating effective and well-crafted plans and then implementing them, the book presents a six-step process developed and field-tested by the Green Infrastructure Center in Charlottesville, Virginia. Well-organized chapters explain how each step, from setting goals to implementing opportunities, can be applied to a variety of scenarios, customizable to the reader's target geographical location.

Green infrastructure encompasses many features in the built environment. It is widely recognised as a valuable resource in our towns and cities and it is therefore crucial to understand, create, protect and manage this resource. This Handbook sets the context for green infrastructure as a means to make urban environments more resilient, sustainable, liveable and equitable. Including state-of-the-art reviews that summarise the existing knowledge as well as research findings, this Handbook provides current evidence for the beneficial impact of green infrastructure on health, environmental quality and the economy. It discusses the planning and design of green infrastructure as a strategic network down to the individual features in a neighbourhood and looks at the process of green infrastructure implementation, emphasising the importance of collaboration across multiple professions and sectors. This comprehensive volume operates at multiple spatial scales, from strategic networks at the regional level to individual features in neighbourhoods, with international case studies used throughout to illustrate key examples of good practice. This collection of expert contributions will be invaluable to students and academics in the fields of planning, urban studies and geography. Practitioners and policy-makers will also find the policy discussion and examples enlightening.

This book analyses international Green Infrastructure (GI) planning and design strategies. The GI strategy is widely recognized for its multifunctionality (as a tool for ecological, economic and social enhancement) and multiscalarity. Starting from this assumption, the book intends to implement the concept of GI and blue networks in planning strategies and their linked urban projects. New urban and regional paradigms of the latest years, such as urban sprawl, ecosystem services, biodiversity, urban resilience, climate change and health emergencies, have made it necessary to rethink cities and territories and their related plans and projects. To satisfy these paradigms, worldwide plans and projects have started to focus both on short-term and long-term processes and strategies which integrate environmental, landscape and ecological elements. Chapters 1 and 6 are available open access under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License via link.springer.com.

This useful guide provides an essential introduction to green infrastructure for planners, landscape architects, engineers and environmentalists.

Over the last decade research exploring green infrastructure planning has burgeoned. Transferable green infrastructure messages between locations though are less well established and there remains a visible gap between the conceptual understanding of green infrastructure and its application in practice. Drawing together evaluations of green infrastructure policy-making and practice from across the world Global Green Infrastructure illustrates where successful practices can be identified. Examples from major green infrastructure development areas in the UK, Europe and the USA highlight the variety of investment options that can deliver socio-economic benefits. There is also a growing awareness of the added value of landscape planning in the rapidly developing cities of India and China. Reflecting on ten international case studies Global Green Infrastructure highlights the ways that ecology and engineered solutions can deliver successful urban development. Based on in situ research with the growing community of green infrastructure researchers and practitioners Global Green Infrastructure looks at the contradictions, consensus, and expanding evidence base of successful investments. This book also presents an in-depth commentary on the contemporary approaches to investment in urban greening and green infrastructure, and draws on the lessons we have learnt from a decade of experimentation, delivery and reflection.

As the population, economy and urban built environment in the Gauteng City-Region (GCR) expand, government is increasingly under pressure to provide urban infrastructure to support growth. It is increasingly important that this infrastructure is sustainable, minimising the negative environmental impacts often associated with traditional forms of urban development. Green Infrastructure (GI) is the interconnected set of natural and man-made ecological systems, green spaces and other landscape features that provide services and strategic functions in the same way as traditional infrastructure. In harnessing the benefits of ecosystem services, GI has emerged as a more efficient, cost effective and sustainable alternative – and sometimes accompanying approach – to conventional forms of infrastructure. Despite international evidence demonstrating how GI can be used as an alternative to, or in tandem with, traditional infrastructure, the GI approach has so far gained only limited traction in the GCR. In 2013 the GCRO published the State of Green Infrastructure in the GCR report. The report established the principles that underpin GI, used available data to map the extent of GI networks in the region, assessed to what extent municipalities were aware of and applying a GI approach, and demonstrated a possible way to value GI in local government financial systems. The conclusions of the State of Green Infrastructure report were used to guide the next phase of GCRO’s research in support of the adoption of GI approach – a phase focused on better understanding the opportunities for implementing GI in planning and infrastructure development programmes and on addressing some of the challenges associated with shifts towards this approach. A framework for a green infrastructure planning approach in the Gauteng City-Region, GCRO’s fourth Research Report, builds on the foundations laid in the State of Green Infrastructure report. It assembles expert inputs and reflections from collaborative stakeholder discussions in what was known as the Green Infrastructure CityLab to illustrate important considerations for the development of a GI planning approach in the Gauteng City-Region (GCR). The report is divided into three broad sections. Part A introduces the theoretical underpinnings of a GI approach and builds an argument for the importance of incorporating GI into planning and infrastructure development in the GCR. Part B presents three pieces written by external experts. They consider how GI and ecosystem services can be valued by municipalities, and how so-called ‘grey-green’ infrastructure design solutions can be implemented in the GCR. Part C reflects on the stakeholder engagement process that has been undertaken, primarily through the GI CityLab, to deepen understanding of how GI can be embedded in municipal practice. Based on these research findings, this report concludes with a strategy for GCRO’s next phase of work in its ongoing Green Assets and Infrastructure Project.

With illustrative and detailed examples drawn from throughout the country, Green Infrastructure advances smart land conservation: large scale thinking and integrated action to plan, protect and manage our natural and restored lands. From the individual parcel to the multi-state region, Green Infrastructure helps each of us look at the landscape in relation to the many uses it could serve, for nature and people, and determine which use makes the most sense. In this wide-ranging primer, leading experts in the field provide a detailed how-to for planners, designers, landscape architects, and citizen activists