Rethinking Gardens and Public Parks (GPP) beyond Greenness: an Integrated Perspective about GPP ecosystem services in Cities

Increased urbanization carries socioenvironmental challenges that may be tackled by promoting green spaces as safeguards of sustainability and of the connection between users and the biosphere – reducing social inequalities, improving air quality, regenerating the ecosystem, and mitigating climate change impacts. Urban green spaces are the main drivers for increasing the quality of urban environments, potentializing local resilience, promoting sustainable lifestyles, as well as improving both the health and well-being of their users. The 11th goal of the 2030 United Nations Agenda for Sustainable Development states that societies must ensure universal access to safe, inclusive, and fully accessible public spaces. Nevertheless, cities are unequal spaces regarding the distribution of environmental resources, resulting in environmental injustice: the most vulnerable areas in socioeconomic terms are those that mostly experience environmental vulnerability, partially due to the lack of green spaces, the intensive road traffic - resulting in poor air quality and the increase of noise pollution – and the social segregation. The fair distribution of urban green spaces must be ensured in both quantity and quality in terms of their ecosystem services: provision, regulation, support, and cultural services. Municipal leaders are the main ones responsible for the maintenance of Gardens and Public Parks (GPP). However, current evidence identifies limited knowledge about urban green infrastructure governance, since the lack of data about PUGS is the main obstacle to effective intervention. Set against this background, this study aimed to identify clusters of ecosystem services potential in 25 GPP in the city of Porto, Portugal, through a validated tool application. Multivariate techniques allowed for the identification of predictor dimensions of ecosystem services potential, environmental quality, and facilities. Five PUGS clusters were validated: i) Environmentally Empowered and Socially Expectant Spaces, ii) Socioenvironmentally Empowered Spaces, iii) Environmentally Empowered but Socially Un-dynamic Spaces, iv) Socioenvironmentally Disempowered Spaces, and v) Socioenvironmentally Unexplored Spaces. Also, ecosystem service potential differs within the city and, in some cases, results in environmental injustice situations. These results are useful in the design of place-based intervention in PUGS, contributing to the increase of ecosystem services potential and in the improvement of urban environment quality and sustainability. Furthermore, instead of focusing on political-administrative jurisdictions, this methodological approach allows gains in scale and enhances ecosystem services potential at a municipal level.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Changing the course of public urban green spaces planning and design: what can we learn from behavioural mapping application?

This presentation aims to explain how behavioural mapping technique may be useful to design proper interventions in public urban green spaces.N/

From local to a universal commitment to achieve the United Nations sustainable development goals

This essay is part of the MDPI Writing Prize, an annual award supported by MDPI Author Services, which provides services including language editing, reformatting, plagiarism checks. The winners of the 2020 MDPI Writing Prize about the theme “My work and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals” are posted on Encyclopedia.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Surgeons Have Motivations Too! An Exploratory Approach To The Main Variables Influencing The Choice Of The Place To Perform Surgeries

Healthcare should be person centred. Alongside, the potentiality of increasing the quality of care provided is higher in motivated medical teams [1,2]. In the hospital sector the operative block is the point of convergence of numerous activities, being connected with the most of the medical services and specialties [3]. Therefore, it is important to keep a harmonious functioning of the structural conditions of the hospital. The present exploratory study aims to know and analyze the motivations that determine surgeons' choice related to the place to perform their surgeries.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Recreating sacred spaces: gardens, public parks and spiritual connections in contemporary cities

In a context of increasing secularization and pluralization, Portugal is one of the European countries with a solid Christian majority (80% of the population declares itself to be Catholic). Like other European historical churches, the Catholic one has, throughout history, celebrated religious rituals within temples and buildings that sacralise the territory and cities. However, traditional religions are being challenged by non-Christian spiritual rituals and meditation practices outside the walls of official religious buildings.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Surgeons Have Motivations Too! An Exploratory Approach To The Main Variables Influencing The Choice Of The Place To Perform Surgeries

Healthcare should be person centred. Alongside, the potentiality of increasing the quality of care provided is higher in motivated medical teams [1,2]. In the hospital sector the operative block is the point of convergence of numerous activities, being connected with the most of the medical services and specialties [3]. Therefore, it is important to keep a harmonious functioning of the structural conditions of the hospital. The present exploratory study aims to know and analyze the motivations that determine surgeons' choice related to the place to perform their surgeries.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Editorial: waste challenges in the context of broad sustainability challenges

https://v2.sherpa.ac.uk/id/publication/26071Editorial on the Research Topic Waste Challenges in the Context of Broad Sustainability Challengesinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Ecoconsciencialização das Cidades: uma emergência global

As cidades estão hoje muito longe da dicotomia urbano/rural. Se recuarmos na história portuguesa, o êxodo rural, que ganhou expressão nos anos 50 e 60 do século XX, desembocou um conjunto de alterações sociais, urbanas e ambientais nas principais cidades (i.e., Regiões do Porto e Lisboa).info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

O Porto visto da FLUP: pistas para um conhecimento das imagens, representações, semânticas e memórias dos estudantes

A investigação aqui proposta insere-se numa lógica de interpretação sensível da cidade, no sentido simmeliano do termo. Nessa medida, inevitavelmente a sua dimensão simbólica é uma constante. Numa sociedade marcada pela volatilidade e pela transfiguração rápida das paisagens físicas e dos espaço urbanos, a representação dos mesmos tende a sofrer (re)configurações. O Porto é a cidade que será objeto de estudo, sendo que a escolha deste espaço urbano reveste-se de enorme pertinência visto terem sido vários os autores, desde o foro académico, passando pelo artístico e pelo literário, que se debruçaram sobre a cidade numa lente sensorial e interpretativa da mesma. Alicerçados nos contributos de Lefebvre e Soja, e inspirados por Kevin Lynch, nomeadamente nos seus mapas mentais, iremos perceber o modo como a cidade é (re)mapeada e como a mesma é elaborada aos olhos dos indivíduos que nela se movimentam. Considerando a relativa heterogeneidade geográfica e mesmo social da FLUP, elegemos os estudantes da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto como população alvo na medida em que a mesma se assume como palco de coexistência de atores provenientes de diferentes espaços do país e do mundo que, por conseguinte, resultam em diferentes formas de (re)apropriações da cidade.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Por uma sociologia do desenvolvimento sustentável: uma reflexão sobre a criação de um novo campo disciplinar

O presente ensaio reflete a oportunidade de desenvolver um campo disciplinar da sociologia orientado para a problemática do desenvolvimento sustentável e apoiado na interdependência dos 17 objetivos para o desenvolvimento sustentável da Agenda 2030 das Nações Unidas. A partir de um exercício de reflexão em torno das conquistas científicas da sociologia nas suas mais diversas áreas, evidencia-se a necessidade de reunir estes saberes e de interpretar e analisar este novo paradigma à luz de uma mudança social que se pretende implementar. Sem pretensões de impor a criação de um novo campo disciplinar, propõe-se antes um exercício de reflexão e imaginação sociológica.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio