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To study the health attributes of urban green spaces in the Yangtze River Delta. This study analyses the mechanisms at play between ecological preferences, place attachment and place identity in urban green spaces in the Yangtze River Delta based on SEM. AHP and entropy-weighted and TOPSIS were used to analyse the influence relationships and spatial differentiation structure of the health benefits of green spaces in the study area. The study shows that, firstly, environmental preferences have a significant positive impact on place attachment, place identity and health benefit evaluation. Place attachment mediates the positive influence of environmental preferences on health outcomes. Second, the focus should be on improving the activity spaces and services in urban green spaces. Attention should also be paid to increasing the density of interactive spaces and the richness of interactive space types. Third, the health indices in the Yangtze River Delta region are roughly proportional to the urbanization rate and the degree of urban development. Emphasis should be placed on the development of urban green spaces in Anhui, strengthening exchanges between cities in the Yangtze River Delta, and standardizing and improving the construction of green belts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Beijing is among the first cities in China to implement a greenbelt policy to improve urban vegetation, which plays a crucial role in enhancing the urban ecological environment. The policies have shown remarkable results. However, long-term evaluation of the performance of the greenbelt policies in Beijing has not been carried out in order to quantitatively evaluate their effectiveness. In this study, long-term satellite observations of the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI), land surface temperature, precipitation, and night-light from 2000 to 2020 are used to investigate the spatio-temporal variabilities in NDVI and explore the mechanisms of the impacts of the greenbelt policies in Beijing. The main results are as follows: (1) From 2000 to 2020, the overall NDVI in Beijing exhibited an upward trend, with the proportion of high-NDVI (>0.8) areas increasing from 26.18% in 2000 to 53.64% in 2020. The proportion of low-NDVI (<0.2) areas continued to decrease from 0.64% in 2000 to 0.2% in 2020. (2) The 1st Greenbelt Zone shows a significant increase in its NDVI (with an average increase of 0.296 units in the NDVI at district level), indicating that the policy's implementation had a notable effect, while the 2nd Greenbelt Zone was mainly in a degraded state and a declining trend, indicating that its performance fell short of expectations. (3) During the preparation for the 2008 Summer Olympics, while the 1st Greenbelt Zone had a slightly negative effect on NDVI improvement, probably due to urban re-construction, the 2nd Greenbelt Zone showed a significant positive effect, leading to an increase of 0.013 units in the NDVI at district level. In addition, the correlation analysis shows that an increase in annual average land surface temperature leads to a decrease in the NDVI, while annual precipitation has a positive relationship with NDVI changes. This study highlights the importance of long-term satellite observations in evaluating the performance of greenbelt policies in Beijing. The evaluation approach developed in this study can be readily applied to similar cities globally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most volatile sites in Jerusalem is the Palestinian neighbourhood of Silwan, at the heart of which lies the City of David archeological site. Much scholarship focuses on the contemporary tensions that arise from its two contradictory identities: an East Jerusalem Palestinian residential community and a Jewish symbol of a mythical past. This article, by contrast, explores a largely overlooked historical moment that has been key to the shaping of these dynamics: the declaration within merely six weeks after the 1967 war of an Israeli national park around the Old City Walls. The article explores how an unrealized British colonial plan for a green belt around the historic walls of Jerusalem was updated in 1967 by Israeli landscape architects using cutting-edge North American environmentalist ideas. Their blueprint, we argue, was crucial to the shaping of the 'holy basin's' spatial logic, landscape imaginaries, and legal structures, necessary to understand the current turn of events. In this process, we highlight the centrality of incorporating longer-term perspectives in the study of contemporary urban realities, bringing into closer dialogue scholarship on present-day urbanism with historical studies of planning and cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For French-speaking geographers, the term urban geopolitics refers to the research stream that the journal Hérodote developed to analyse the increasing complexity of and conflict in and around territorial policies. For their English-speaking counterparts, the concept commonly refers to a more recent approach to analyse among others the militarisation of urban space. Despite their differences, this paper shows that both approaches can be usefully combined. Indeed, a combined approach can shed new light on urban processes by enriching the comparison between seemingly "similar" urban policies in the Global North and South. The aim of this paper is to discuss the merits of the two schools of urban geopolitics. To do so, it compares the creation of green belts in the peripheries of large cities to control urban sprawl: Lyon (France) and Rabat (Morocco). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, the leisure time of the inhabitants is increasing, meaning that urban green spaces are becoming more and more valuable, as people visit these places more often and for longer periods to spend their spare time there. In the aftermath of the Covid pandemic, these open spaces are playing an even more important role in social interaction. The features used by different groups of the society (sociotopes), the aesthetics and the atmosphere of green spaces all have an impact on the experiences gained in the area, all these may determine our perception and opinion of the given space. The present research aims to show, through the example of Stockholm's green spaces, the factors responsible for good or negative experiences and whether there is any correlation between these and the urban green space types. Stockholm was the first city to win the European Green Capital Award in 2010, showing its leadership in environmental thinking and being a role model for other European, including Hungarian (Budapest, Pécs) cities that have also applied for the European Green Capital Award but were not shortlisted as finalists. Stockholm can also be described as 'part water, part green belt, part city', as stated in an official document published by the European Commission (2010, p. 21). Stockholm ranks highly among European cities in terms of green space accessibility (Buckland--Pojani 2022), Green City Index score and environmental policy (Akande et al. 2019), as well as in terms of public satisfaction with the quality of life in the city (Okulicz-Kozaryn 2013), therefore may serve as a best practice model for other cities. A categorisation of Stockholm's green spaces has been carried out in this study, using Ibes' (2015) paper as a basis. According to this, six categories can be distinguished by using ten variables. The green space categories identified in the analysis show differences in the number of sociotope functions and differences in the temporal (time of day, season, length of stay), frequency (visits to the area) and economic (cost of services in the area) aspects of these categories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Referring to the case of three municipalities surrounding Bogotá, we analyze the distinct features and specific implications of metropolization process. We argue this process is not merely a result of typical urbanization dynamics, but it also comes from specific decision of some social groups, omissions, and absence of coordination between territorial bodies. In that sense, the recently established Bogotá-Cundinamarca Metropolitan Region might be an opportunity to address the problems resulting from metropolization processes and solve some of its shortcomings. Furthermore, its potential lies in the possibility of generating a unified vision of the future and effective coordination between the instruments of planning, management, monitoring and control of land use. Finally, based on this article analysis and as a contribution to the discussions of the debate around the Metropolitan Region, we propose a green belt between Bogotá, Cota and Chía, to reduce the tendency to conurbation and the continuous expansion of the urban area of Bogotá over the Sabana Centro province. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Legally protected by its own constitution since 1991, the greenbelt (or 'GrünGürtel') forms a ring of greenspace around Frankfurt, Germany and has been considered an effective reaction to municipal development pressures. As a response to Frankfurt's embeddedness within a highly interconnected suburbanized region under extensive growth pressures, the Regionalpark RheinMain was established to upscale the greenbelt to the regional level. In this article, we explore the institutional complexities of upscaling a localized greenbelt to the regional scale in the Frankfurt Rhine-Main region, which is known for its fragmented institutional environment formed by numerous planning authorities and special purpose agencies with overlapping jurisdictions. Engaging with the literature on the governance of greenbelts from an institutional perspective, we analyse how the development of the Regionalpark RheinMain is shaped by horizontal, vertical and territorial coordination problems. We conclude that that the Regionalpark RheinMain is not appropriately institutionalized to serve as an effective regional greenbelt, resulting in localized initiatives and the delegation of greenbelt planning to municipalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The green belt, without question the most well-known and influential legacy of town and country planning in the UK, continues to attract interest from a wide range of interested parties – from those eager to maintain the protection it offers to the countryside, to others more concerned at the negative impacts it is argued to have on housing supply and consequently prices. In this paper we explore how the arguments for a green belt around a particular city in the UK – Liverpool – were built up over the middle years of the twentieth century, in particular through three important (sub-)regional plans. Analysis of those plans is situated within national policy and nationwide rhetoric to illustrate how perfectly justifiable arguments about the need to limit urban sprawl "baked in" resentment and opposition to much-needed housing growth. A situation which, as the final section of the paper briefly reflects upon, not only contributed to the wide-scale construction of high-rise flats in the city from the 1950s onwards, but continues to resonate today through the objections lodged against attempts to enhance the spatial footprint of the city through development on the green belt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Proposed the STLCF to modify the unrealistic land cover change. • The STLCF is based on the spatio-temporal transition probability. • The STLCF significantly improved the spatio-temporal consistency of annual land cover maps. Annual analyses of land cover dynamics in urban areas provide a thorough understanding of the urbanization effects on environment and valuable information for the improvement of urban growth modeling. However, most current studies focus on major land cover changes, such as urbanization and vegetation loss. The most feasible way to evaluate the complex interactions among different land cover types is the post-classification change detection, but the temporal inconsistency in the time series of land cover maps impedes the high-frequency and long-term analyses. This study proposed a spatio-temporal land cover filter (STLCF) to remove the illogical land cover change events in the time series of land cover maps, and analyzed the annual land cover dynamics in urban areas. The knowledge of illogical land cover change events was 'learned' from the land cover maps through the spatio-temporal transition probability matrix, instead of experts' knowledge. The illogical change was modified with the land cover of the maximum probability calculated from the naïve Bayesian equation. The STLCF was tested in Wuhan, a typical densely urbanized Chinese city. The annual land cover maps from 2000 to 2013 were derived from multi-date Landsat images using the Decision Tree (DT) classifier. Results showed that the STLCF improved the mean overall accuracy of annual change detection by about 6%. Additionally, the amount of land cover trajectories with unrealistically frequent changes was significantly decreased. During the study period, 7.86% of the pixels experienced one land cover change, and about 0.57% of the pixels experienced land cover changes more than once. The annual analyses demonstrated the non-linear increasing trend in urbanization as well as the corresponding trend in vegetation loss in the study area. We also found the conversion from built-up areas to vegetation near rivers and lakes and in the reserves and rural areas, mainly caused by the restoration of built-up areas to the park or green belt/wedges along rivers and new roads in the metropolitan areas, and to the cropland and woods in the rural areas. Results of this study showed the importance of the spatio-temporal consistency check with knowledge derived from land cover maps of the study area, which facilitates the annual analyses of major and subtle land cover dynamics in urban areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reclaiming the Urban Commons: The Past, Present and Future of Food Growing in Australian Towns and Cities: Edited by Nick Rose and Andrea Gaynor. Extends the discussion historically with its fine chapters by Gaynor (see also her book), Clay, and Kunek and Shone, and the conclusion by Rose. Significantly, I Reclaiming the Urban Commons i points to the structural and political problems that frame food resilience. [Extracted from the article]

In the present study, a novel approach based on multi-criteria analysis was proposed to prioritize PM mitigation strategies from economic, environmental and social aspects. Multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) methods are suitable tools for prioritizing strategies on various topics. However, it has been observed that adding/removing strategies has led to a change in preference which is called rank reversal. The present study was aimed with three objectives: (i) evaluating the rank reversal phenomenon in MCDM methods frequently used in environmental topics, (ii) introducing a novel approach based on wins in league (WIL) in order to reduce the rank reversal in MCDM methods and (iii) a new application of this method in prioritizing PM mitigation strategies in arid urban areas. Qualitative results showed that in studies in the field of environment, the rank reversal has occurred frequently in classical MCDM methods but its occurrence was prevented in the proposed method. Quantitative evaluation also showed that the probability of rank reversal occurrence in Technique For Order Performance By Similarity To Ideal Solution (TOPSIS), Additive Ratio ASsessment (ARAS), Weighted Aggregated Sum Product Assessment (WASPAS), Evaluation Based On Distance From Average Solution (EDAS), Combinative Distance-Based Assessment (CODAS) and Measurement Alternatives and Ranking According to Compromise Solution (MARCOS) methods was 36.4%, 32.8%, 21.2%, 31.6%, 36.1% and 29.9%, respectively. However, the probability of rank reversal occurrence in the proposed approach was almost 90% less than classical MCDM methods. Evaluation of PM mitigation strategies in arid urban areas has also shown that urban green belt plan is the most appropriate strategy. • Rank reversal (RR) in TOPSIS, ARAS, WASPAS, EDAS, CODAS and MARCOS was evaluated. • A guideline for choosing proper MCDM method in environmental science was introduced. • New proposed approach based on wins in league greatly reduced the RR occurrence. • 10 strategies from 6 attribute was analyzed by MCDM methods to reduce PM mitigation. • Urban green belt was the best strategy for urban areas near dust sources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distribution of open space about towns near rivers and mountains plays an extremely significant role in the inheritance of the regional characteristics. This study aims to explore the distribution of open spaces in 14 different towns, all with a history of over 10 years in Yuan River Basin. Our findings indicate that the towns are similar in size, and open spaces are characteristics of the marginalisation, and the plant configuration mode is similar, which could come into beings out of reasons as follows: the macro-layout is influenced by the space scale of the surrounding rivers and mountains; and the medium-layout is influenced by time, space and other aspects left over by history, plant configuration of open spaces is subject to the capacity of plant in conservation of water and soil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on the Garden City movement founded by Ebenezer Howard. It cites the similarities between the Garden City and the English Garden City idea. Howard believes that every human being has the right to ample space to live a healthy and useful life. It details the vision of Howard on a home colony.

It is widely acknowledged that Ebenezer Howard's Garden City inspired many important urban planning achievements throughout the world. Using democratic dilemmas as a means of characterizing Garden City allows attention to be drawn to the political 'work' that this form of planning undertook. Examination of Garden City's realization at Letchworth and its core democratic values reveals Howard's prescient struggle with the central contradictions of democratic planning, illustrating the difficulties of achieving social goals in planning framed by liberal democracy. While significant gains were made in living conditions through the development of the Garden City, its realization through largely liberal-based market mechanisms emphasized its physical virtues at the expense of its social goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Because the heat island effect can make cities warmer than their surroundings, it can make urban dwellers uncomfortable and even affect their health, which is particularly pronounced in developed cities in southern China. To reduce the heat island effect and improve the environment, various types of vegetation have been planted in the urban green belt. Though previous studies have been conducted on the beauty, air purification functions and cooling effect of vegetation, little is concentrated on the different cooling effects and control factors of various common shrubs on the heat island effect in cities. In this study, five of the most regionally common shrubs were selected to study the cooling effect in Guangzhou, southern China. The maximum surface temperatures of five shrubs and pavement were compared using infrared temperature sensors from April 1st 2019 to October 31st 2019. Results show that (1) All five shrubs showed noticeable seasonal variation, and the average surface temperatures of the five shrubs were between 38.0 and 42.2 °C during May–August and 30.7–34.1 °C during the other seasons (April, September and October);. (2) Murraya exotica L. exhibited the best cooling effect on the maximum surface temperature. Its value was 44.7 °C, and the absolute difference values of Murraya exotica L. (10.3 ± 1.7 °C) were higher than any other shrub during the study period; (3) Both the LAI (R2 = 0.57, p < 0.01) and plant height (R2 = 0.13, p < 0.01) are control factors of the cooling effect on vegetation surface temperature for the five shrubs. This study revealed the differences in the cooling effect and influencing factors of five regionally common shrubs on the heat island effect. Research on the functional characteristics of plants and plant selection in urban green belts has both theoretical and practical significance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A new town's self-containment under greenbelt regulations is a planner's hope modelled after Howard's historical proposal. A planner chooses whether to increase the new town's size to improve its self-containment or to form satellite-city networks. If the hope is an unattainable goal, a planner in reality should consider mass-transit connection with existing urban centres. The first-generation new towns in Korea can provide an important lesson as they can be categorised into large-sized self-containment towns and mid-sized networked towns, both of which followed transit-oriented developments. By reviewing the historical background and using multilevel multinomial logistic analysis of commuting data, this study confirmed the following results. First, the commuting rate to Seoul from the larger two new towns is no better than from the other three mid-sized towns. Second, networked new towns with the surrounding satellite cities promoted commutes to the periphery, but the rate of automobile usage is high. Finally, as the government invested in improvements of the transit connections, all five new towns achieved the goal of being sustainable regarding transit use. In the automobile age, a planner building a new town under urban containment regulations should embrace the difficulties of achieving a metropolis that is both self-contained and transit-oriented. • A new town planner under greenbelt regulations has chosen whether to increase the new town's size to improve its self-containment, or to form a satellite-city networks. • If the self-sufficient new town is an unattainable goal, a planner in reality should consider mass-transit connection with existing urban centres. • This study confirmed that the commuting rate to Seoul from the large-sized new towns is no better than from the other three networked mid-sized new towns. • Mid-sized new towns networked with the surrounding area to promote commutes to the periphery, but the rate of automobile usage also increased. • The first-generation new towns achieved the goal of being sustainable in terms of transit use, may call 'transit-oriented metropolis' (TOM). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]