Abstract
This article presents an innovative approach to the concept of facilitating greenways into sustainable landscape planning. The greenways can be planned by application of a landscape-ecological concept, including analysis and synthesis of selected abiotic, biotic, and socio-economic landscape-ecological factors and recreation conditions, and by reviewing the current landscape structure and condition of linear components of green infrastructure. Determining the landscape ecological stability, visual impact of agricultural lands, potential erosion risks and real erosion processes, and identifying the natural, cultural, and historical values in the landscape, contributes to the design of ideal greenways placement and other linear components of green infrastructure. Applying these proposals to the agricultural landscape would increase the ecological stability and connectivity, decrease soil and water erosion risks, eliminate visual impact, and develop recreational infrastructure. In this way, greenways planning brings about a synergy between sustainable rural development, landscape and nature protection, and landscape aesthetics, which provides optimal landscape utilization and may encourage tourism and economic prosperity in the study area. Finally, in addition to the researched ecological benefits, our greenways proposal represents an alternative connection of settlements in rural agricultural landscapes, and so it can stimulate sustainable mobility and recreation as well as physical activity, health, and well-being.
Highlights
Around 30% of agricultural landscapes in the EU have been facing a moderate risk of land abandonment in the context of an inter-related network of biophysical, farming, structural, market, regional, institutional, and policy factors that have affected decisions on land use and its changes
Greenways as a linear component of green infrastructure are a good example of the modern environmental concept of recreational landscape utilization and sustainable mobility
In order to demonstrate this definition, we performed analyses and evaluation of size categories of agricultural cultures, ecological stability, connectivity, potential erosion, real erosion forms, and certain socio-economic phenomena selected according to recreational potential
Summary
Around 30% of agricultural landscapes in the EU have been facing a moderate risk of land abandonment in the context of an inter-related network of biophysical, farming, structural, market, regional, institutional, and policy factors that have affected decisions on land use and its changes. Management issues and structural adaptation remain the key drivers of governance. Land use changes are the consequences of two main processes–intensification and marginalization, frequently seen together within the same area [1]. The rural regions of Slovakia are facing the same challenges of rural abandonment, largely as a result of abandonment or land use intensification [2]. Extensive land use has been substituted with intensive land use, which has brought about many environmental problems due to the sustainability gap. All local changes are happening against the background of global changes such as climate changes, biodiversity loss or deforestation
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