A Review of Emerging Scientific Discussions on Green Infrastructure (GI)-Prospects towards Effective Use of Urban Flood Plains

Abstract

The goal of the present review is to collect data on trending scientific discussions on applying green infrastructure (GI) approaches to the effective use of urban floodplains and conceptualize potential future directions. A systematic literature review methodology was employed for this review. We reviewed 120 scholarly articles published between 2011 and 2022 under a predefined protocol. In this review, we discuss the trending dialogues on GI approaches and their applications. The research gap in applying GI approaches for macro-level urban-flood-plain management is addressed by (a) speculative arguments drawn from reviewed GI case studies, (b) an analysis of the trends’ strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT), and (c) presenting the concurrent ‘green–gray’ debate on neutral ground. Evidently, GI has its strengths and opportunities, as well as weaknesses and threats. The approaches to GI can be customized according to the application purpose, the regional or locational context, and the intended capacity. Following the analysis of emerging GI discussions, we position the current GI dialogues into four categories: (i) the green–gray continuum; (ii) GI for sustainable and resilient cities; (iii) GI as a resolution for urban issues; and (iv) the green–gray debate. In this classification, we strongly argue that placing GI in a more certain and instrumental position can be optimally achieved in the ‘green–gray continuum’ concept with a win–win scenario. Therefore, scientifically investigating the ‘green–gray continuum’ possibilities in a futuristic approach is strongly recommended.