Refine
Document Type
- Doctoral Thesis (1)
- Review (1)
Language
- English (2)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (2)
Keywords
- spatial planning (2) (remove)
Urbanization and agricultural land use are two of the main drivers of global changes with effects on ecosystem functions and human wellbeing. Green Infrastructure is a new approach in spatial planning contributing to sustainable urban development, and to address urban challenges, such as biodiversity conservation, climate change adaptation, green economy development, and social cohesion. Because the research focus has been mainly on open green space structures, such as parks, urban forest, green building, street green, but neglected spatial and functional potentials of utilizable agricultural land, this thesis aims at fill this gap.
This cumulative thesis addresses how agricultural land in urban and peri-urban landscapes can contribute to the development of urban green infrastructure as a strategy to promote sustainable urban development. Therefore, a number of different research approaches have been applied. First, a quantitative, GIS-based modeling approach looked at spatial potentials, addressing the heterogeneity of peri-urban landscape that defines agricultural potentials and constraints. Second, a participatory approach was applied, involving stakeholder opinions to evaluate multiple urban functions and benefits. Finally, an evidence synthesis was conducted to assess the current state of research on evidence to support future policy making at different levels.
The results contribute to the conceptual understanding of urban green infrastructures as a strategic spatial planning approach that incorporates inner-urban utilizable agricultural land and the agriculturally dominated landscape at the outer urban fringe. It highlights the proposition that the linkage of peri-urban farmland with the green infrastructure concept can contribute to a network of multifunctional green spaces to provide multiple benefits to the urban system and to successfully address urban challenges. Four strategies are introduced for spatial planning with the contribution of peri-urban farmland to a strategically planned multifunctional network, namely the connecting, the productive, the integrated, and the adapted way. Finally, this thesis sheds light on the opportunities that arise from the integration of the peri- urban farmland in the green infrastructure concept to support transformation towards a more sustainable urban development. In particular, the inherent core planning principle of multifunctionality endorses the idea of co-benefits that are considered crucial to trigger transformative processes.
This work concludes that the linkage of peri-urban farmland with the green infrastructure concept is a promising action field for the development of new pathways for urban transformation towards sustainable urban development. Along with these outcomes, attention is drawn to limitations that remain to be addressed by future research, especially the identification of further mechanisms required to support policy integration at all levels.
One commonly proposed method to limit flood risk is land-use or zoning policies which regulates construction in high-risk areas, in order to reduce economic exposure and its vulnerability to flood events. Although such zoning regulations can be effective in limiting trends in flood risk, they also have adverse impacts on society, for instance by limiting local development of areas near the water. In order to judge whether proposed land-use or zoning policies are a net benefit to society, they should be accepted or rejected based on a societal cost-benefit analysis (CBA). However, conducting a CBA of zoning regulation is complex and comprehensive guidelines of how to do such an analysis are lacking. We offer guidelines for good practice. In order to assess the costs and benefits of zoning as a climate change adaption strategy, they should be assessed at a societal level in order to account for public good features of flood risk reduction strategies, and because costs in one area can be benefits in another region. We propose a multistep process: first, determine the spatial extent of the zoning policy and how interconnected the zoned area is to other locations; second, conduct a CBA using monetary costs and benefits estimated from an integrated hydro-economic model to investigate if total benefits exceed total costs; third, conduct a sensitivity analysis regarding the main assumptions; fourth, conduct a multicriteria analysis (MCA) of the normative outcomes of a zoning policy. A desirable policy is preferred in both the CBA and MCA. This article is categorized under: Engineering Water > Planning Water Human Water > Value of Water Science of Water > Water Extremes Human Water > Methods