Abstract
Facing accelerated urbanization and landscape alteration, cities expand on the territory showing better or worse relationships between built environment and green spaces. Based on recent literature review, this article discusses the green wedges, green belts and greenway planning models in order to evaluate their capability in answering contemporary ecological and social issues. The article presents a conceptual overview of the selected planning models through a recent literature review, looking at the fundamental concepts of green infrastructure; then, it enlightens the connections between the spatial forms and the functions derived of these forms. These three models are connected infrastructures, varying between the ring, the star or linear forms. What differs the most is the capacity to encompass existing patches like forests or other valuable areas and the proximity and distribution of green spaces throughout the city. Whilst green belts, for their fringe condition, distance itself from the majority of inner-city dwellers, both green wedges and greenways can cross the urban fabric, and reach a greater number of neighborhoods, although the simple existence of these features does not guarantee their social functions. These findings have significant implications for the design of city expansions and can help to configure better neighborhoods in growing cities.
Highlights
The world is facing an unprecedented transformation brought about by population growth, accelerated urbanization and consequent landscape alteration
These results suggest that there is an association between the form and the urban function of green spaces, despite the differences in context
The green belt and the green wedge models were conceived as planning tools to manage, control and direct urban sprawl (Amati, 2008; Sturzaker & Mell, 2016; Lemes de Oliveira, 2017)
Summary
The world is facing an unprecedented transformation brought about by population growth, accelerated urbanization and consequent landscape alteration. There is sufficient evidence in support of the multiple-benefits of urban green spaces (Van Den Berg et al, 2015) They have the potential of homing multiple environmental and ecological functions such as protecting water resources, enhancing biodiversity, sequestering carbon, ameliorating microclimate and supplying food. Green spaces are critical in meeting cultural and health needs of residents by providing recreational spaces, preserving historic landscapes and enhancing the aesthetic of neighborhoods. These various functions, called ecosystem services, need to be considered simultaneously and to be balanced (Lovell & Taylor, 2013). There is still a need to further understand how to morphologically spatialize green areas in cities in order to locate an increasing number of dwellers while maintaining or promoting livable and sustainable environments (Lemes de Oliveira, 2019)
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