Sustainability: is it too late?

UPLanD intend to promote an interdisciplinary approach to town and regional planning, landscape and environmental design as an effective form of the governance - sustainable and eco-efficient - of processes for the protection, enhancement and development of urban contexts. The first issue of third Volume of UPLanD intended to dwell on the subject of resources’ conservation considering that after an era of irresponsible use and that of ideological conservation is the time for an overall rethinking of the strategies with which sustainability is pursued. Because if it is impossible to continue to waste resources, it is often too late to simply protect what is left. Soil, landscape, water, air, biodiversity, climate: in many areas of the planet the level of compromise is such that only a virtuous process of regeneration can bring the system back to a condition of “sustainable” equilibrium. Furthermore the fact that 54% of world population already live in cities and by 2050 two more billion inhabitants will be added, shape this issue in a predominantly urban dimension. Lack of sustainability generates many consequences. Among these, climate change is perhaps the most relevant. Cities, besides contributing to the causes of climate change, suffer its negative effects, with strong impacts on the quality of life of inhabitants. It is here, in fact, that the hazards resulting from the phenomenon, given the high levels of vulnerability and exposure, generate the most significant risks

Risk Economy: the effectiveness of urban supportive policies for the safety and resilience in town centres

According to the theories of Campos Venuti in the 1980s urban planning went from a mainly expansive approach to a new one centered on transformation processes. The 1990s and the first decade of the new century saw the disintegration of disciplinary boundaries with the pairing of urban policies with social, fiscal, environmental and finally ecological ones. Today, with such themes we pair emergency ones that require immediate responses, in as far as they are intimately connected to the safety and quality of urban life. The very recent seismic events in central Italy demonstrate the need to directly involve the built heritage in a securing process. The scarcity of resources and the need to govern such practices in a coordinated way that is also respectful of the values at hand gives the matter a urban planning dimension above all. This article is an account of a research on the subject that was conducted at the Federico II University in Naples. The thesis is that solutions to the unsafety of built environment is to be found in public-private partnerships, in a collaborative approach based on urban policies and concrete incentives

RED: hazard, vulnerability, exposure

UPLanD intend to promote an interdisciplinary approach to town and regional planning, landscape and environmental design as an effective form of the governance - sustainable and eco-efficient - of processes for the protection, enhancement and development of urban contexts. The first issue, entitled RED, intended to bring attention to the topic of risks in built and natural environment. Risks are a consequence of hazards, but also and above all, of vulnerability and exposure. But, while hazards are usually part of the environment, exposure and vulnerability originate from three main reasons: ignorance or underestimation of hazards; the belief of being able to managing to their effects; the indifference towards a distant and hypothetical risk as compared to an immediate and concrete benefit. Today the development of adequate policies, the improvement and sharing of best practices, and a careful design research are essential to deal with risks. The very recent seismic events in central Italy furthermore demonstrate the need to immediately focus on the topi

Risk Economy: the effectiveness of urban supportive policies for the safety and resilience in town centres

According to the theories of Campos Venuti in the 1980s urban planning went from a mainly expansive approach to a new one centered on transformation processes. The 1990s and the first decade of the new century saw the disintegration of disciplinary boundaries with the pairing of urban policies with social, fiscal, environmental and finally ecological ones. Today, with such themes we pair emergency ones that require immediate responses, in as far as they are intimately connected to the safety and quality of urban life. The very recent seismic events in central Italy demonstrate the need to directly involve the built heritage in a securing process. The scarcity of resources and the need to govern such practices in a coordinated way that is also respectful of the values at hand gives the matter a urban planning dimension above all.This article is an account of a research on the subject that was conducted at the Federico II University in Naples. The thesis is that solutions to the unsafety of built environment is to be found in public-private partnerships, in a collaborative approach based on urban policies and concrete incentives

RED: hazard, vulnerability, exposure

UPLanD intend to promote an interdisciplinary approach to town and regional planning, landscape and environmental design as an effective form of the governance - sustainable and eco-efficient - of processes for the protection, enhancement and development of urban contexts. The first issue, entitled RED, intended to bring attention to the topic of risks in built and natural environment. Risks are a consequence of hazards, but also and above all, of vulnerability and exposure. But, while hazards are usually part of the environment, exposure and vulnerability originate from three main reasons: ignorance or underestimation of hazards; the belief of being able to managing to their effects; the indifference towards a distant and hypothetical risk as compared to an immediate and concrete benefit. Today the development of adequate policies, the improvement and sharing of best practices, and a careful design research are essential to deal with risks. The very recent seismic events in central Italy furthermore demonstrate the need to immediately focus on the topi

Data Exchange Processes for the Definition of Climate-Proof Design Strategies for the Adaptation to Heatwaves in the Urban Open Spaces of Dense Italian Cities

The growing awareness of the danger of extreme weather phenomena highlights the inadequacy of current cities and the increase in their level of vulnerability concerning the impacts resulting from climate change. The theme of design to combat climate impacts requires the development of knowledge and process models capable of managing the complexity of the information necessary to direct a climate-proof transformation of the urban systems. The research made it possible to develop a methodology based on the exchange of data between GIS-based ICT tools and for parametric design, to analyze the microclimatic and performance behavior of recurrent types of urban open spaces in Italian cities, characterized by different climatic conditions, through generic urban patterns, homogeneous in terms of building density and morphology. The goal achieved was to define the critical aspects of urban open spaces with the performance offered in response to the phenomenon of heatwaves, to verify and measure the performance effectiveness of climate-proof intervention categories, to transfer these results in the form of database, hazard maps, and potential levels of adaptation, and to define guidelines for the climate-oriented project. The transfer of the project data took place through a decision support webGIS platform (SDSS)

Urban Water Management 2.0: a review

Soil, landscape, water, air, biodiversity, climate: in many areas of the planet the degradation degree of such resources requires a virtuous process of reconversion, regeneration and, in some cases, de-urbanization. Recent research on Mediterranean metropolitan areas has shown, in fact, that de-urbanization constitutes a need that is now an essential requirement of these territories. Where to find necessary financial resources? The North European examples of urban renewing, from the Bo01 of Malmö to the Hammarby Sjöstad of Stockholm, from the London GMV to the Vauban of Friborg, show that the response to housing problems constitutes a privileged catalyst for innovative environmental and social policies on an urban scale. Indeed, they demonstrate that urban planning has the potential to find in itself the financial sources necessary to reverse the processes of ecological degeneration that have affected cities. Some authors believe also that it is too late for an approach limited in preventing new land take and environmental impacts. Furthermore, they think we need widespread building substitutions and the technological adaptation of the infrastructural system. High density would seem to lend itself to become a criterion for the design of such interventions. But high density also needs for an efficient urban water management in order to face both: the increased soil sealing and the increase in rains intensity, that is an effect of climate change. In this contribute, introducing next issue of UPLanD, we focus on upgrading the WSUD approach toward a planning scale one, usually referred as Water Sensitive Urban Planning

Sustainability: is it too late?

UPLanD intend to promote an interdisciplinary approach to town and regional planning, landscape and environmental design as an effective form of the governance - sustainable and eco-efficient - of processes for the protection, enhancement and development of urban contexts. The first issue of third Volume of UPLanD intended to dwell on the subject of resources’ conservation considering that after an era of irresponsible use and that of ideological conservation is the time for an overall rethinking of the strategies with which sustainability is pursued. Because if it is impossible to continue to waste resources, it is often too late to simply protect what is left. Soil, landscape, water, air, biodiversity, climate: in many areas of the planet the level of compromise is such that only a virtuous process of regeneration can bring the system back to a condition of “sustainable” equilibrium. Furthermore the fact that 54% of world population already live in cities and by 2050 two more billion inhabitants will be added, shape this issue in a predominantly urban dimension.Lack of sustainability generates many consequences. Among these, climate change is perhaps the most relevant. Cities, besides contributing to the causes of climate change, suffer its negative effects, with strong impacts on the quality of life of inhabitants. It is here, in fact, that the hazards resulting from the phenomenon, given the high levels of vulnerability and exposure, generate the most significant risks

Urban Water Management 2.0: a review

Soil, landscape, water, air, biodiversity, climate: in many areas of the planet the degradation degree of such resources requires a virtuous process of reconversion, regeneration and, in some cases, de-urbanization. Recent research on Mediterranean metropolitan areas has shown, in fact, that de-urbanization constitutes a need that is now an essential requirement of these territories. Where to find necessary financial resources? The North European examples of urban renewing, from the Bo01 of Malmö to the Hammarby Sjöstad of Stockholm, from the London GMV to the Vauban of Friborg, show that the response to housing problems constitutes a privileged catalyst for innovative environmental and social policies on an urban scale. Indeed, they demonstrate that urban planning has the potential to find in itself the financial sources necessary to reverse the processes of ecological degeneration that have affected cities.Some authors believe also that it is too late for an approach limited in preventing new land take and environmental impacts. Furthermore, they think we need widespread building substitutions and the technological adaptation of the infrastructural system. High density would seem to lend itself to become a criterion for the design of such interventions. But high density also needs for an efficient urban water management in order to face both: the increased soil sealing and the increase in rains intensity, that is an effect of climate change.In this contribute, introducing next issue of UPLanD, we focus on upgrading the WSUD approach toward a planning scale one, usually referred as Water Sensitive Urban Planning