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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]

The primary purpose of urban growth management policies is to control urban sprawl and induce the diversification of travel mode share. Hence, how the greenbelt, as an urban containment policy, affects travel mode share is one of the important issues in understanding the efficacy of urban growth management. To analyze it for the Seoul Metropolitan Area (SMA), which has designated its greenbelt for more than forty-five years, this study implemented the spatial Durbin panel regression for the years from 2002 through 2016. Results showed that the greenbelt increased the use of public transportation and decreased car use, but it tended not to increase the use of nonmotorized modes of transportation such as bicycling and walking. There also turned out to be U-shaped (convex) relationships both between population density and car use and between the former and bicycling. Meanwhile, an inverted U-shaped relationship was observed between population density and public transportation mode, which was statistically significant. Based on these results, it can be said that a public transportation system outside of the greenbelt is needed for increasing its accessibility. To promote the use of public and nonmotorized transportation, it will also be important to determine the appropriate urban density. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The colonial Garden City Movement represents the culmination of a whole sequence of relationships between botany and imperialism that had developed from the seventeenth century onwards, but particularly in the Victorian era. Botany was central to the transnationality of imperialism and botanical exploration while plant collecting fed into many Victorian phenomena in Britain which also had their colonial counterparts. These were intended to alleviate the social, environmental and medical evils of industrialism, providing a closer interaction between the rural and the urban. They included the creation of green belts, the founding of model villages, the emergence of municipal public parks and botanical gardens, and finally the garden city movement. By these means it was intended that industrial (and sometimes rural) workers should experience a healthier lifestyle, as well as a social uplift which would mitigate class conflict while also providing rational recreation. In the export of garden city ideas to the British Empire, there were additionally significant colonial precedents in street tree planting and in the beautification movement of the Victorian era and early twentieth century. This article specifically focuses upon the translation of aspects of this garden city movement and of these other influences into the creation of the new capital of Lusaka in Northern Rhodesia (Zambia) in the twentieth century and the manner in which a great diversity of both indigenous and exotic plants were used to express the idealistic characteristics of this urban development while also reflecting the social and racial norms inherent in the colonial relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Green Belt is one of the most widely known and popular regional growth management policies having been adopted around the world. Drawing upon the regional spatial imaginary and historical institutionalist literature alongside a case study of the West Midlands, this paper conceptualizes the Green Belt as an enduring, regionalizing concept in the spatial vision of planners and professional campaigners. It underscores the continuing importance of planning history and critical junctures in 'framing' the perspectives and aspirations of practicing planners regarding strategic planning. The paper charts the emergence, embedding, and adaptability of the Green Belt as an institution before exploring how strategic vision has continued to be vitally important to planners and campaigners despite the abolition of statutory strategic planning in England in 2010. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greenbelt policies were designed more than a century ago in Europe to control urban growth, preserve agricultural land and conserve nature, although they have repeatedly failed in their attempt to contain the urban sprawl. Gradually, these initiatives have been incorporating new functions such as the provision of ecosystem services, with special emphasis on the provision of ecosystem services. In Europe, various studies indicate that there has been an evolution from greenbelts, designed as a containment line for urban growth, to green infrastructures, more permeable and connected. In this article, we explore these dynamics by comparing the cases of three green rings, Ottawa and Ontario in Canada and São Paulo in Brazil, implemented in America. The cases show the consolidation of these initiatives and their evolution towards broader green infrastructures, although with uneven results in the fulfillment of the policy objectives, since a high governance capacity is required to carry out complex coordinated management between the various levels of governments, the different municipalities and other private and public interests involved in green infrastructures. [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]

Situated in northern Europe, the capital regions of Helsinki, and Oslo have many similar premises concerning urban development. However, the structure of the two regions differs by many measures. We explore the differences in urban density and its development in the both regions and the policy instruments that have affected them. Differences are identified by comparing the population densities of urban settlements and the mean distances from residents and workplaces to the city centres of Oslo and Helsinki using GIS methodology and existing literature. In the Oslo region, the population density shifted from a decreasing trend to an increasing one in the late 1980s. In contrast, the Helsinki region only started to densify in the 2010s. Also, the mean distance of residents and workplaces from the city centre is farther in Helsinki. The long period of low-density housing development and the creation of jobs outside centres in Helsinki is related to weaker political steering towards a compact urban form. In Oslo, regulations such as a greenbelt policy but also physical factors, led to densification relatively early. Lagging in densification policies, Helsinki could learn from the experiences of steering land use and mobility in Oslo, which would need additional research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has been motivated by a wide range of concepts of the term urban green infrastructure. As the aim was to indicate a clear basis for the term, an investigation of its development was a necessity, not only in the European, but also in a broader context. Although green infrastructure is included in the 21st century policies of protection and development of EU landscapes, its foundations can be traced back to the models of ideal Renaissance towns and urbanist concepts mainly from the 19th and 20th century. In these historical periods used concepts meant urban landscapes as systems, a part of the environment, as seen in green corridors, green belts, green wedges, green networks and through the perception of urban green 1 University of Zagreb, Faculty of Agriculture, Svetošimunska 25, Zagreb, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4158-8918 2 University of Zagreb, Faculty of Agriculture, Svetošimunska 25, Zagreb 3 University of Zagreb, Faculty of Agriculture, Svetošimunska 25, Zagreb, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9774-4158 ihrdalo@agr.hr pperekovic@agr.hr dtomic@agr.hr Scientific Subject Review https://doi.org/10.31522/p.29.1(61).5 UDC 711.4 (947.5) Technical Sciences / Architecture and Urban Planning 2.01.02. - Urban and Physical Planning Article Received / Accepted: 24. 11. 2020. / 18. 6. 2021. systems. As a modern concept the urban green infrastructure has been upgraded with developed roles, extending functions, scopes and scales from previous historical models. In that sense it maintains its social role of improving the quality of life in towns, while at the same time defining town texture with its urban morphological significance. At the same time it also develops ecological values and extends its scale to nonurban local, regional and international contexts. Despite its benefits, spatial planning documents in the Republic of Croatia still lack measures and actions which would recognise the true benefit of green infrastructure in spatial development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

İmrahor Valley, which covers a significant part of the urban fringe in Ankara, has a crucial role in conserving the ecological balance of city with its landscape and other natural features. The valley has long been considered as one of the most important ecological areas of the city and protecting the valley as part of green system has been a primary objective since the first plan of city. However, the valley has rapidly lost its natural characteristics under the effects of recent planning policies and implementations. This article investigates the changes in İmrahor Valley as a contemporary example of the transformations at the fringe of Ankara. The aim of this article is to analyze the changing process of the valley and to determine the factors affecting this process. In the light of previous literature, researches and interviews, it is seen that the plan revisions since the mid-2000s, market forces and speculative pressures have been the main drivers that increase the tension in the valley and pave the way for construction. The importance of greenbelt regulations, protective land policies and the plan decisions taking into account the upper-scale ecological systems are also emphasized in the article. [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]

This study assesses trends (1960–2010) in forest cover over a Mediterranean metropolitan region (Attica, Greece) with the aim to investigate the role of local contexts promoting changes in the use of land. Forest cover decreased in a spatially heterogeneous manner over the study period determining a land-use structure coherent with the Von Thunen mono-centric model. We used a multivariate exploratory analysis of 26 contextual variables to identify changes in the urban spatial structure at the local scale. The shift from a land-use structure based on urban–rural and cropland-forest polarizations in the early 1960s to a pattern based on the polarization in medium-density, mixed urban/agricultural areas and low-density, sparse forest land has been observed in the last 50 years. Urban expansion into rural land and the establishment of protected areas in economically marginal and remote districts has been identified as relevant drivers of landscape transformation in the area. Our study demonstrates that land-use changes driven by expansion of dispersed settlements may consolidate mono-centric urban structures. A concentric land-use distribution around the central city is compatible with urban sprawl and may be indirectly supported by ‘green belt’ regional planning and environmental policies protecting high-quality natural land. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over a period of three decades, from 1928 to 1959, the Congrès Internationaux d'Architecture Moderne (CIAM) formed an unconventional working team and a complex laboratory of progressive ideas for designing the city. During the founding years of the organization and the transatlantic emigration of many of its major figures during the second half of the 1930s, a profound engagement with the most important trends in the European and North American debates on planning had become the critical foundation for their common task. The organization's consequent basic convictions and demands summed up the most effective maxims of the discipline since the turn of the century. Officially, CIAM tried to distinguish itself from traditional urban planning and instead advocated modern urban planning as the antithesis to everything that existed previously. Seen from a historical perspective, however, numerous points of connection – in particular to the garden city movement – become very clear. The various members of CIAM were deeply influenced ideologically by Ebenezer Howard's visions for urbanism. Personal contact to representatives of the garden city movement, active involvement in its institutions, and broad implementation of Howard's ideas in the context of European and North American planning led CIAM from the analysis of the functions of the existing city to a comprehensive design of the modern city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Ontario Places to Grow Plan, finalized in 2006, marks the boldest attempt to address urban sprawl in Canada, and arguably North America. Among its many components, the Plan establishes a permanent greenbelt covering roughly 1.8 million acres (728,000 hectares) of environmentally sensitive land. This article seeks to explain the political calculations and conditions that led to the Ontario policy. I argue that the Plan was partially devised to garner support in key suburban ridings (electoral districts) across the Greater Toronto Area in the 2003 provincial election. The campaign marked the final ingredient in the opening of a critical 'policy window' through which dramatic changes in land-use policy could be realized. The Ontario case underlines the utility of adaptive models of policy making to the study of environmental policy, but suggests that these models perhaps underemphasize the desire of politicians and political parties to pursue policies in their electoral interest. El Plan de Lugares de Ontario para Crecer, publicado en 2006, señala el intento más audaz para hacer frente a la expansión urbana en Canadá, y quizás en toda Norteamérica. Entre sus muchos componentes, el plan establece un cinturón verde permanente que cubre aproximadamente 1.8 millones de acres (728,000 hectáreas) de tierra ambientalmente sensible. Este artículo busca explicar los cálculos políticos y las causas que llevaron a dicha política. Argumento que el plan fue parcialmente ideado para reunir apoyo de distritos suburbanos electorales clave a través del Área Metropolitana de Toronto en la elección provincial de 2003. La campaña marcó el ingrediente final en la apertura de una 'ventana política' crítica que permitió cambios dramáticos en la política de uso de suelo. El caso de Ontario subraya la utilidad de modelos adaptativos de hechura de políticas en el estudio de la política ambiental, pero sugiere que quizás estos modelos subestiman el deseo de los políticos y los partidos de buscar políticas que los beneficien electoralmente. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present a theoretical model of residential growth that emphasises the path-dependent nature of urban sprawl patterns. The model is founded on the monocentric urban economic model and uses a cellular automata (CA) approach to introduce endogenous neighbourhood effects. Households are assumed both to like and to dislike the density of their neighbourhood, and are assumed to trade-off this density with housing space consumption and commuting costs. Discontinuous spatial patterns emerge from that trade-off, with the size of suburban clusters varying with time and distance to the centre. We use space-time diagrams inspired from ID elementary CA to visualise changes in spatial patterns through time and space, and undertake sensitivity analyses to show how the pattern and timing of sprawl are affected by neighbourhood preferences, income level, commuting costs, or by imposing a green belt. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Greenbelts have been widely applied to contain urban growth, provide recreational opportunities, and improve the quality of life. Since 2005, the Province of Ontario, Canada has established a greenbelt in response to rapid urban growth threatening agricultural lands and natural heritage. This research paper assesses Ontario's greenbelt initiative by examining four factors identified by previous studies as contributors to successful applications of greenbelt policies. Factors examined include: political will, pubic support, greenbelt planning, and enabling legislation. The paper points to Ontario's greenbelt strengths and challenges, and provides policy recommendations that may contribute to successful greenbelt applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the debates on whether rural-urban fringe may or may not be subject to Green Belt policy in Great Britain. These debates in the country illustrate the types of questions that occupy policy makers across the world, particularly on how to plan or manage urban hinterlands in the future. Also, it has been acknowledged that planning will play an important role in some part of fringe management.

Countries around the world have responded to the problems associated with rapid urban growth and increasingly land-consumptive development patterns by creating a wide range of policy instruments designed to manage urban growth. Of the array of growth management techniques, urban containment policies are considered by some to be a promising approach. This paper focuses on greenbelts, the most restrictive form of urban containment policy. The long-standing greenbelt of Seoul, Republic of Korea is examined as a case study. Seoul's greenbelt has generated both significant social costs and benefits. Costs include higher land and housing prices in the urban area surrounded by the greenbelt, additional costs incurred by commuters who live beyond the greenbelt and work in Seoul, and increased congestion and related quality of life impacts. Benefits include the amenity value of living near the greenbelt, recreational resources, bequest and heritage values, fiscal savings due to increased efficiency in the provision of public services and infrastructure, and a wide range of life-supporting ecosystem services. After standing virtually unchanged for almost three decades, Korea's greenbelt policy is currently being revised and weakened, largely due to pressure from greenbelt landowners and developers. Although there is no definitive answer to the question of whether Seoul would be a more or less ‘sustainable city’ today without the greenbelt, it is certain that in the absence of the greenbelt, Seoul would have lost much of its rich natural heritage and essential ecosystem services. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on legislation presented to the Victorian Parliament in April 2003 that establishes an urban growth boundary, defines the extent of the green belts and prevents subdivision below existing minimum lot sizes. Importance of non-urban metropolitan areas; Need for legislative protection; Nature of green belts; Methods of implementation and protection.

Examines the contributing factors to the planned development of greenbelts around London, England that were originally established to contain urbanization. Adequacy of land supply in accessible locations; Regional price inflation and increased volatility of prices; Social exclusion issues; Distortion in construction, repair and maintenance investments.

The issue of releasing the Development Restriction Zones, which is called by "Green Belt", in Korean society is controversial. Green Belt is a protected area designated around the city to restrict urban development in order to prevent urban sprawl and ensure a healthy living environment for citizens by conserving the natural environment surrounding cities. However, there are many opinions on the removal of the Green Belt due to recent problems such as restrictions on property rights of residents living in the Green Belt zone. But the releasing of the Green Belt is likely to damage not only the environmentally valuable land inside the Green Belt but also the land outside the Green Belt due to excessive urban expansion. This is because it has previously restricted construction in Green Belt areas and helped prevent urban areas to spread outside.In this study, the SLEUTH urban expansion model was used to examine how urban expansion would occur if the Green Belt was released. We also looked at how much of the environmentally valuable land will be damaged by the expansion of cities. The SLEUTH model is a type of urban expansion model that is derived from the preceding letters of input data "Slope, Landuse, Excluded, Urban, Transport and Hillshade". This model is based on the Cellular Automata model and is not only a simple urban expansion, but also a policy-driven one due to the presence of the "Excluded" layer.Three major methods have been used to identify how environmentally valuable areas have been damaged. First, the changes in land cover were analyzed. It was analyzed whether natural areas, such as forests and grasslands, have been converted to artificial areas such as cities whether the Green Belt area is released or not. Second, an altitude and slope analysis was performed. High altitudes or steep slopes are areas that need to be protected environmentally, and where is expected to cause serious damage to urban residents. Third, it is a way to utilize the environmental map provided by the Korean government. The Korean government is developing a map that evaluates environmental values such as the Ecological and Natural Map and the Environmental Conservation Value Assessment Map. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]