Global green infrastructure lessons for successful policy making investment and management

Examples from major green infrastructure development areas in the UK, Europe and the USA highlight the variety of investment options that can deliver socio-economic benefits, whilst ther

Over the last decade, research exploring green infrastructure planning has geoned Transferable green infrastructure messages between locations, though, are less well established and there remains a visible gap between the conceptual under-standing of green infrastructure and its application in practice Drawing together evaluations of green infrastructure policy-making and practice from across the world,

bur-Global Green Infrastructure illustrates where successful practices can be identified

Examples from major green infrastructure development areas in the UK, Europe and the USA highlight the variety of investment options that can deliver socio-economic benefits, whilst there is also a growing awareness of the added value of landscape planning in the rapidly developing cities of India and China

Reflecting on ten international case studies, Global Green Infrastructure

high-lights the ways that ecological and engineered solutions can deliver successful urban

development Based on in situ research with the growing community of green structure researchers and practitioners, Global Green Infrastructure looks at the

infra-contradictions, consensus and expanding evidence base of successful investments This book also presents an in-depth commentary on the contemporary approaches

to investment in urban greening and green infrastructure, and draws on the lessons

we have learnt from a decade of experimentation, delivery and reflection

Ian Mell is a Lecturer in Planning & Civic Design at the University of Liverpool He

teaches and researches green infrastructure and planning issues across the world, evaluating the opportunities and disconnects between landscape planning strategy, policy and practice

brims over with the author’s natural enthusiasm and provides many nities to consider the potentials of green infrastructure It is the first text that provides a full picture of the growth, present situation and future possibilities for green infrastructure planning plus the theoretical background It gives useful contextual summaries of the antecedents of the concept and comments on the varying shades of green in related planning approaches, policies and methods

opportu-It is persuasive in the way it addresses economic, stakeholder engagement and policy issues through the case study analyses This is not just an ideas book or

an analysis of past achievements Through reflection on the global situation and extensive personal experience on the subject, Ian Mell gives a clear vision of the benefits and adaptability of a green infrastructure approach and its role as a natural successor to sustainability thinking in landscape planning’

Maggie Roe, Newcastle University, UK

Global Green Infrastructure

Lessons for successful policy-making, investment and management

Ian Mell

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN

and by Routledge

711 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

© 2016 Ian Mell

The right of Ian Mell to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 All rights reserved No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.

Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered

trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Names: Mell, Ian, author.Title: Global green infrastructure : lessons for successful policy-making, investment and management / Ian Mell.Description: Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2016 | Includes bibliographical references and index.Identifiers: LCCN 2015035054| ISBN 9781138854642 (pbk : alk paper) | ISBN

9781315720968 (ebook)Subjects: LCSH: Landscape protection | Greenways | Natural areas | Human ecology | Regional planning—Environmental aspects | City planning— Environmental aspects | Ecosystem services.Classification: LCC QH75 M387 2016 | DDC 333.73—dc23LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015035054

Preface vii

1 Introduction: green infrastructure: what, where and why? 1

2 The antecedents of green infrastructure: Olmsted, Howard and

3 Green infrastructure: linking concepts with practice 42

4 The USA: water management in Chicago and the Atlanta Beltline

8 China: evaluating the value of green infrastructure planning in

9 Global reflections of green infrastructure investment: successes

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The evolution of green infrastructure has been quite a personal one for me I was born in the smallish town of Wakefield in West Yorkshire, where Sandal Castle was the majestic landscape of my early childhood We then moved to north Lincolnshire in 1989–90 and the arable landscapes of the east of England became home While we played in fields and along the river bank, it never occurred to me that the difference between the urbanity of Wakefield and the rurality of Lincolnshire was one of multi-functional green infrastructure My friends and I played, walked, talked and explored the landscape that offered almost unlimited opportunities to interact with nature (Richard Louv would be proud) Now, of course, this is clearly framed as a broader understanding of the affordances offered by a diverse environ-ment And then I went to university Moving to Newcastle to study Geography and Environmental Management provided me with new insights into how people, place and landscapes interact Furthermore, the coastline of Tyneside, the Northumbrian hills and, most importantly, the cultural heritage of Hadrian’s Wall all brought to the fore the value of landscape: socially, economically and ecologically

If we move forward 20 years I sit in an office overlooking Liverpool’s two drals and a minute from Abercrombie Square at the centre of the University of Liverpool campus Again, landscapes imbued with social and ecological meanings

cathe-I also look at the images in Fig 1.1 on my office wall: landscapes For better or worse, green infrastructure has influenced my research, hence this book, my teaching and

my hobbies Understanding what motivates us to use and value landscapes, as well

as the more technical and bureaucratic nuances of green infrastructure planning, are therefore at the centre of this, and at the heart of this book Throughout it reflects on over two decades of landscape and urban greening and includes over ten years of my own work in the field On occasions this presents more individual assessments of prac-tice based on my own interactions with planners, politicians and developers, while

in other places we hear from respected commentators in the field (pun intended) Over the last decade research exploring green infrastructure planning has bur-geoned Globally, there is a growing consensus of what, where and how investment

in green infrastructure should be implemented, which is, in many locations, ported by an innovative and integrated policy-making and advocacy arena Green infrastructure can therefore be considered the ‘go-to’ approach to contemporary landscape planning as it holistically addresses climate change, social development and economic valuation simultaneously

sup-Transferable green infrastructure messages between locations are less well established Moreover, there is a visible gap between the conceptual understand-ing of green infrastructure and its application in practice This, partially, reflects the versatility of the concept to meet a number of landscape planning objectives simultaneously, but also illustrates the variability in policy and practice across the world As a result there has been, to date, no global synthesis of green infrastruc-ture policy and planning which draws on case study material from more than one location A number of authors (Austin, 2014; Rouse & Bunster-Ossa, 2013; Kambites & Owen, 2006; Benedict & McMahon, 2006; Beatley, 2000) all con-textualised their understanding of green infrastructure in a single location, be it

at a city or continental scale This book aims to be the first to comprehensively draw together primary assessments and evaluations of green infrastructure pol-icy-making and practice in its major development areas (the UK, Europe and the USA) It will also be the first to explore the growing value of green infrastructure in expanding regions such as India and China, highlighting the value of green infra-structure as a multi-functional and integrated approach to urban development and management

The following book presents evidence from across the globe, examining the opment, role and utility of green infrastructure in urban landscape management By drawing on a discussion of a number of key thematic principles (multi-functionality, scale, temporal change, investment policy formation/structures, and delivery focus) it

devel-evaluates each, debating the ex-ante opportunities, as well as the ex-post successes,

that green infrastructure offers to local-, regional- and national-level planners

Based on in situ research undertaken with the growing green infrastructure

com-munity of researchers and practitioners in the UK, USA, Europe, India and China, the book looks at the contradictions, consensus, expanding evidence base and benefits proposed for green infrastructure planning This presents the first in-depth and com-prehensive commentary on the contemporary approaches to investment in urban greening/green infrastructure, where innovations have proved successful, but will also draw on the lessons we have learnt from investment over the previous decade Overall, the book offers insights into how green infrastructure is and can be developed in different locations By drawing together case studies from around

the world, the following chapters ask the big questions: who is developing green infrastructure, why, and how?

Ian MellDecember 2015

Many people should take credit for this book Since 2005 I have had the incredible support of a number of amazingly insightful people who have helped to shape my understanding of green infrastructure These include colleagues in academia, plan-ning practice and local government; but also family and friends who have pushed

me all the way to presenting these ideas

I would first like to thank Maggie Roe at Newcastle University, without whom none of this would have been possible; also in Newcastle, Geoff Vigar, Clive Davies and Rob MacFarlane for their initial and ongoing support The support provided

by the University of Massachusetts and Jack Ahern was also invaluable in helping

me get to where I am today I’d like to thank John Henneberry and the team at the University of Sheffield for the opportunities they provided on the VALUE project, and in particular Berna Keskin for being a rare thing: a great colleague and friend

In local authority in the UK, all the people at East Cambridgeshire District Council who worked on the Ely Country Park and Planting Parishes projects, particularly Julie Cornwell; green infrastructure really did turn out to be a ‘win–win’ situation Also, everyone who worked on the second Cambridgeshire Green Infrastructure Strategy in local government and local environmental sector Moreover, everyone in the community forest sector in the North-West and North-East (Pete Stringer, Paul Nolan, Chris McGloin, Donna Murphy, among others), who have been a massive help, and still are

Many people have also been crucial in helping put this book together around the world In India, Manoj Dabas (Aravali Foundation & Centre for Urban Green Spaces, New Delhi); Surman Rai (Life and Leaf, Darjeeling), Saswat Bandyopadhyay and Sejal Patel (CEPT University, Ahmebadad), and all those people who were interviewed or took part in research activities, thank you all

In the USA my thanks go to the staff and students in Landscape Architecture & Regional Planning at the University of Massachusetts, the EPC and Parks & Recreation Department in New York, Abby Cristimoso formerly of Metro Planning, Louise Young at CMAP, Cathy Geraghty at Wilderness, Deborah Shore at the Chicago MWRD, Nancy Williamson with the Illinois DNR, Harriet Festing at the Center for Neighborhoods, and Tom Price with Conservation Design Forum and others all in Chicago Erica Davies, Catherine Owen, Lee Harrop, Paul Morris and Kevin Burke at the Atlanta Beltline and Robby Bryant of HDC Inc in Atlanta for their insights into the development of the Beltline

In the UK, Peter Massini at the GLA (and formerly Natural England), the ous environmental agencies in London, David Bethall (formerly of Cambridgeshire County Council) and the other Cambridgeshire green infrastructure people, Liz McClelland at the Woodland Trust, and the various community forest partnerships who’ve forced green infrastructure planning in government policy And in Europe, colleagues in Italy, Sweden and Germany: Giovanni Sanesi, Enrico Calvo, Benedetto Selleri, Cecil Konijnendijk van der Bosch, and Stephan Pauleit

vari-There are also a number of people a little closer to home that need thanking

My family, who have provided support, critiques and anecdotes to make this book possible, I’ll be forever grateful John Sturzaker who has dealt with a decade of me talking about trees and grass and stuff, you’ve been a massive help and a great friend; John – where is Wye? And finally, Alice, who’d have thought we’d be here now (apart from you, obviously)? We’ve made this happen

Funding for this work was made available from the Urban Knowledge Network Asia (UKNA, 2014), an ESRC CASE Award (2005–2009) and University of Liverpool Pump Priming and Start-up funding (2013–2015)

Finally, I’d like to thank all those at Routledge, especially Louise Fox and Sade Lee, for their support in making this happen, I couldn’t have done it without you

AMC Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation

ANGSt Accessible Natural Green Space Standards

ARUR Plan Local d’Urbanisme

AUDA Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority

BAP Biodiversity Action Plan

BJP Bharatiya Janata Party

BLF Big Lottery Fund

CCC Cambridgeshire County Council

CEMDE Centre for Environmental Management of Degraded EcosystemsCIAT Countryside In and Around Towns

CIL Community Infrastructure Levy

CMAP Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning

CNT Center for Neighborhood Technology (Chicago)

CSL Commission for a Sustainable London

DCLG Department for Communities and Local Government

DCMS Department of Culture, Media and Sport

DDA Delhi Development Authority

DNR Illinois Department for Natural Resources

DoE Department of Environment (Chicago)

DoT Department of Transport (Chicago)

ELC European Landscape Convention

ENGO Environmental Non-Governmental Organisation

EPA US Environmental Protection Agency

ERSAF Ente Regionale Per I Servizi All’Agricoltura e Alle Foreste

GIS Geographical Information Systems

GLA Greater London Authority

HGF Housing Growth Funding

IGIA Indira Gandhi International Airport

LDF Local Development Framework

LI Landscape Institute

LLDC London Legacy Development Corporation

LOCOG London Organising Committee for the Olympic and Paralympic GamesLPA Local Planning Authority

MARTA Metropolitan Atlanta Regional Transport Authority

MoU Memorandum of UnderstandingMWRD Municipal Water Reclamation District (Chicago)NCR National Capital Region (New Delhi)

NDD nature-deficit disorderNGO non-governmental organisation NHS National Health Service NITI National Institution for Transforming IndiaNLUD National Land Use Data

NPPF National Planning Policy FrameworkODA Olympic Development AuthorityODPM Office of the Deputy Prime MinisterOPDC Olympic Park Development Corporation OPLC Olympic Park Legacy CorporationPPP public–private partnership PPS/PPG Planning Policy Statement/GuidanceQUANGO Quasi Autonomous Non-Governmental Organisation RDA Regional Development Agency

RoW rights of wayRSS Regional Spatial Strategy RTPI Royal Town Planning InstituteS106 Section 106 Planning Obligation SCDC South Cambridgeshire District Council SEMAEST Société d’économie mixte d’aménagement de l’Est ParisienSIP Singapore Industrial Park

SPA School of Planning and Architecture (New Delhi)SRFDCL Sabarmati Riverfront Development CorporationSSSI site of specific scientific interest

SUDS sustainable urban drainage system SWAT Strategic Water Analysis

TCPA Town & Country Planning AssociationTCPO Town & Country Planning OrganisationTPS Town Planning Scheme

UDPFI Urban Development Plans Formulation and ImplementationVALUE Valuing Attractive Landscapes in the Urban EconomyWFD Water Framework Directive

XJTLU Xi’an Jiaotong-Liverpool UniversityZAC Zones d’Aménagement Concreté

Green infrastructure: what, where and why?

This book opens with two thoughts that will help focus the following discussion of

green infrastructure The first is an anecdote and the second relates to Fig 1.1 Both,

I would argue, illustrate that we need to take a much broader view on how we value

the landscapes around us and how this should influence the ways in which we

man-age them While each thought is, of and in itself self-contained, they do highlight

some of the issues of focus, terminology, scale and valuation that will be discussed

in more depth throughout the following chapters It is envisaged that these thoughts

will act as a starting point for the much deeper conversation presented in this book

and assist in tying together the myriad aspects of green infrastructure planning

Figure 1.1 Office

landscape photographs, Liverpool (UK).

The first thought relates to a conversation that occurred in 2006 when I was asked to explain what green infrastructure was by a family member I proceeded to spend the next 30 minutes discussing the various principles, benefits and locations in which green infrastructure could be found In reply I heard: ‘So green infrastructure can be my garden?’ Yes, I replied, but then went on to explain that it could also

be a whole range of landscape features including woodlands, water resources and some built environment infrastructure (e.g cycle paths)

Moving forward to 2014 and I was once again asked what green infrastructure

is by the same family member She had heard news reporters talking about structure’ (in relation to transport and housing development) and wanted to know

‘infra-whether there was any connection to green infrastructure Yes, I replied, there are elements of green infrastructure thinking embedded in other forms of urban and landscape planning What we have to remember, though, is that the context of an investment is central to the benefits they can deliver Talking on this again, on 7 June

2014, I was watching BBC World News in Ahmedabad, a location in India that will

be discussed in Chapter 7, and an item on climate change was being discussed The reporter was discussing how businesses in the UK were redesigning parking areas using porous pavements, bioswales and filtration traps to make economic savings Finally, green infrastructure seems to be penetrating the mainstream!

In the eight years between these two conversations the principle uses of green infrastructure have developed extensively within landscape and urban planning (Allen III, 2012; Beatley, 2012; Kambites & Owen, 2006; Mell, 2010) The level of debate discussing its values has extended from a small number of research clusters in the

UK and USA into a global exploration of the value of green infrastructure, which has become embedded in the scoping, planning and management of landscape resources

Figure 1.2 Urban

green infrastructure,

Vancouver (Canada).

(Beatley, 2000; Davies et al., 2006; Weber & Wolf, 2000; Williamson, 2003) Although

research from the UK and USA is still at the forefront of this process, there is a

grow-ing literature in Europe and increasgrow-ingly in Asia, reviewgrow-ing the opportunities green

infrastructure provides to address socio-economic and sustainability issues (Boyle

et al., 2013; Lemma & Overseas Development Agency, 2012) We can therefore

argue that expansion has brought landscape back into the mainstream discussions of

development, providing it with a greater visibility, and vis-à-vis, integrity

Over the same timescale we have also seen green infrastructure filter through

into university teaching curriculums, watched the creation of an increasing number

of strategies and guidance documents and witnessed green infrastructure being

embedded within international (e.g European Union), national (e.g the UK) and

sub-national policy (e.g Cambridgeshire, UK) Moreover, in spite of the variation

evi-dent in the details of how and why green infrastructure is being developed between

locations, there is a positive association between the discussions of its value and

its development within policy and practice (Landscape Institute, 2013; Lerner &

Allen, 2012; Hostetler et al., 2011; Roe & Mell, 2008) However, although there is

a growing understanding of what green infrastructure is, how it can be used and

what social, ecological and economic value it can deliver, there is still a lack of

con-sensus regarding how these various elements of landscape and green infrastructure

should be addressed (Mell, 2013a) This is not, in many cases, a negative, because

as landscape planners continue to plan more sustainable places, such variation can

provide alternative approaches for development that instil a more appropriate focus

for investment (Wright, 2011)

The second thought relates to Fig 1.1 This photograph was taken in January

2015 in my office in the oldest Planning School in the UK, at the University of

Liverpool It is presented as it represents, to me at least, a number of the key issues

Figure 1.3 Forestry

Commission GI Guidance (UK).

we deal with when we discuss green infrastructure Fig 1.1 shows a number of photographs used in my teaching and research materials that, like many academ-ics, were taken on holiday They show a number of landscapes in Canada, mainly

in Vancouver and Vancouver Island, which have meanings to me as an individual Academically they highlight the range of activities and landscape types that can be considered green infrastructure They also illustrate, again to me, some of the most fundamental issues in green infrastructure research that will populate this book:

perceptions, scale, focus and multi-functionality The images help to tell the story of

our cultural and industrial relationships with the landscape; they show the wonder and awe that trees can promote; and they highlight that each of us will find value in different aspects of a given landscape Our understanding of these issues, and the ways in which they interact, therefore frames how we address the scoping, design, implementation and management of the landscape

To address these issues, this book sets out a systematic exploration of these issues focused on a decade of evidence gathering and analysis of green infrastruc-ture research Using examples of investment from a number of locations across the globe, both established and growing, the following examines the focus, value and opportunities for investment in green infrastructure Each example illustrates how a nuanced understanding of the local landscape context is needed if planners are to promote an appropriate set of parameters for development Drawing on interactions and a dialogue with a range of stakeholders (academics, policy-makers, practition-ers and user groups) the following chapters explore how green infrastructure can

be used to create valuable assets in urban areas and how they can tackle the key landscape issues of climate change, water management, ecological capacity, and socio-economic growth

The book also presents a personal milestone Since 2005 I have worked extensively

on green infrastructure planning I have been lucky enough to work with incredibly dedicated and insightful people to help develop the academic debates of its meaning (Mell, 2013a, 2010, 2008); I was part of the team who scoped, consulted, wrote and supported the second Green Infrastructure Strategy (Cambridgeshire Horizons, 2011) I have also stood in muddy fields on cold mid-winter mornings discussing the best forms of biodiversity management, recreational improvements and accessibility needed within a range of green infrastructure projects I have seen how green infra-structure discussions become both increasingly vague yet simultaneously nuanced when explored in international forums As a consequence, green infrastructure has shaped a significant proportion of my working life The following book is therefore populated with professional commentary, but is supported by additional personal insights into the development of green infrastructure in a number of these different locations

1.1 Why green infrastructure and why now?

Over the last decade, research exploring green infrastructure planning has burgeoned

(Boyle et al., 2013) Globally, there is a growing consensus of what, where and how

investment in green infrastructure should be implemented, which is, in many tions, supported by an integrated policy-making and advocacy arena (Benedict &

loca-McMahon, 2002; Goode, 2006; Lennon, 2014a) Green infrastructure can therefore

be considered as having positioned itself as a ‘go-to’ approach in contemporary

landscape planning, as it holistically addresses climate change, social development

and economic valuation simultaneously (Mell, 2010)

Transferable green infrastructure messages between locations are less well

estab-lished Moreover, there is a visible gap between the conceptual understanding of green

infrastructure – the what is it questions, and its application in practice – the so what

questions (Vandermeulen et al., 2011) This, partially, reflects the versatility of the

concept to meet a number of planning objectives simultaneously, but also illustrates

the variability in planning policy and practice across the world As a result there has

been, to date, no accepted single global synthesis of green infrastructure which draws

on case study material from more than one location A number of authors, including

Austin (2014), Gill et al (2007) and Rouse & Bunster-Ossa (2013), have though each

contextualised their understanding of green infrastructure in a single location To date,

Mell’s (2010) is one of the few evaluations which attempts to find a common narrative

across a number of locations; in this case the UK, USA and Western Europe

The following discussions aim to be one of the first, if not the first, to

com-prehensively draw together primary in-depth assessments and evaluations of the

development, role and utility of green infrastructure in policy-making and practice

in each of its major development areas (UK, Europe and USA) It will also be the

first to explore the growing value of green infrastructure in expanding regions,

such as India and China, to highlight the value of green infrastructure as a

multi-functional and integrated approach to urban planning By drawing on a discussion

of a number of key thematic principles – multi-functionality, scale, temporal change,

investment policy formation/structures and delivery focus – the following

evalu-ates how we can debate ex-ante opportunities, as well as the ex-post successes of

green infrastructure which can offer local-, regional- and national-level planners

an insight into the benefits associated with investment in urban greening (South

Yorkshire Forest Partnership & Sheffield City Council, 2012; Town & Country Planning

Figure 1.4 Street trees

in Ahmedabad, India.

Association, 2012a) Based on in situ research undertaken with the growing green

infrastructure community of researchers and practitioners in the UK, USA, Europe, India and China, the following looks at the contradictions, consensus, expanding evidence base and benefits being proposed for green infrastructure planning This presents a comprehensive commentary on the contemporary approaches to green infrastructure investment, assessment, and where innovations have proved success-ful, but will also draw on the less successful lessons we have learnt from investment over the previous decade

1.2 What is green infrastructure?

Green infrastructure is simultaneously a simple yet very complex approach to scape planning At its core are a small number of accepted characteristics that have

land-Figure 1.5 Promenade

Planteé, Paris, France.

Figure 1.6 Locals

playing Mahjong and

cards in a public green

space in Shanghai,

China.

been discussed within the academic and practitioner literature since it was first

dis-cussed in the late 1990s (Williamson, 2003) These principles, based on notions of

connectivity between people, places and resources, accessibility to the landscape and

the delivery of a range of benefits within an integrated approach to urban-landscape

development, are all key ideas within the green infrastructure literature, all of which

are focused on the assumption that green infrastructure can, and does, promote

landscape multi-functionality Subsequently, green infrastructure has been reported

as supporting ecological functions, social needs and economic improvements (Austin,

2014; Benedict & McMahon, 2006; Davies et al., 2006; Mell, 2010; Natural England

& Landuse Consultants, 2009; Weber et al., 2006) Since its first use in the late 1990s

(Rouse & Bunster-Ossa, 2013) the ways in which green infrastructure has developed

also illustrates that this set of assumptions have become normative

For example, in the UK, green infrastructure planning has taken a more holistic

approach to the integration of socio-economic and environmental influences

com-pared to the water-centric approach popularised in the USA (Mell, 2012; Rouse &

Bunster-Ossa, 2013; Thomas & Littlewood, 2010) Therefore, although the focus of

application may differ, within these discussions the principles noted above have been

repeatedly discussed to form the conceptual framework for green infrastructure

planning Taking a synthesis of the existing research as a starting point, this book

views green infrastructure in the following way:

GI includes the network of green spaces and other natural elements such as

rivers and lakes that are interspersed between and connect villages, towns and

cities Individually these elements are GI assets and the roles that these assets

play are GI functions When appropriately planned, designed and managed,

these assets and functions have the potential to deliver a wide range of social,

environmental and economic benefits

(Landscape Institute, 2009: 4) The Landscape Institute and others (Benedict & McMahon, 2006; England’s

Community Forests & Forestry Commission, 2012; Mell, 2012; Natural England &

Landuse Consultants, 2009; Sandström, 2002) presented a number of key

charac-teristics, which they suggest are central to our understanding of green infrastructure

These include: establishing connected landscapes, promoting multi-functionality,

supporting the management of a range of green infrastructure assets and

integrat-ing the development of more liveable/sustainable places with policy All of these

reflect upon the proclamation of Benedict and McMahon (2006), who emotively

proposed that green infrastructure is the life support system of our landscapes

and needs to be considered as a series of interactions between socio-economic and

environmental factors

The following chapters use these key principles to frame the discussion of green

infrastructure in each case study The final chapter extends these discussions to show

where best practice is visible, but also where opportunities lie for the development of

further innovations in green infrastructure thinking, policy and practice However, it

is also important to identify at the outset what landscape resources constitute green

infrastructure before moving on to a discussion of why it’s important

Green infrastructure, as noted at the start of this chapter, is a dichotomous cept Fundamentally it is a very simple idea, yet in practice the range of resources which illustrate either the physical or conceptual principles of green infrastructure is much wider In basic terms green infrastructure is the natural or landscape resources that we see in our environments However, if we can delve deeper and begin to apply different typologies of spatial restrictions to green infrastructure, we start

con-to see a more fluid interpretation of how planners and practitioners categorise these resources A range of academics, government offices and practitioners have attempted to find a common thread between these two positions, which has met

with limited success (Ahern, 2007; Kousky et al., 2013; Madureira et al., 2011;

Mell, 2007; Schilling & Logan, 2008) We have also seen a number of attempts

led by national agencies in the UK and USA to produce guidance on what actually constitutes green infrastructure From a UK perspective the guidance produced by

Natural England and Landuse Consultants (2009) was one of the first instances of

an agency identifying a specific set of characteristics to ground green infrastructure thinking They proposed five such categorisations (see Table 1.1), through which they have subsequently developed guidance for scoping projects, allocating funding and establishing management programmes

Natural England’s typology is not exhaustive It does, however, illustrate the ability in what they constitute a green infrastructure resource to be Such variation

vari-is a positive for green infrastructure policy-makers and practitioners, as it provides them with a number of alternative delivery options This can also be described as a potential hindrance, as it provides too great a diversity for the same planners and policy-makers, which in turn can limit the development of consensus for investment (Mell, 2013a; Wright, 2011) One benefit of the Natural England typology, as well

as those produced by the Conservation Fund (Benedict & McMahon, 2006) and the Town & Country Planning Association (Town & Country Planning Association, 2004),

Table 1.1 Natural England green infrastructure typology

Classification Resources

Parks and gardens Urban parks, country and regional parks, formal gardens

Amenity greenspace Informal recreation spaces, housing green spaces, domestic gardens,

village greens, urban commons, other incidental space, green roofsNatural and semi-natural urban

greenspaces

Woodland and scrub, grassland (e.g downland and meadow), heath

or moor, wetlands, open and running water, wastelands and disturbed ground), bare rock habitats (e.g cliffs and quarries)

Green corridors Rivers and canals including their banks, road and rail corridors, cycling

routes, pedestrian paths, and rights of wayOther Allotments, community gardens, city farms, cemeteries and

churchyards

Source: adapted from Natural England & Landuse Consultants, 2009

though, is that it promotes a national-level discussion of what green infrastructure

is and isn’t

In his initial scoping study Mell (2010) attempted to address the complexities of

this process, stating that green infrastructure could be understood if the ‘Grey–Green

Continuum’ developed by Davies et al (2006) was utilised They both went on to

discuss how as planners and practitioners we can identify the value in a number

of different landscape resources moving from more engineered and grey (i.e built)

forms to increasingly more identifiably green ones (i.e trees and grasses) The

con-tinuum therefore implies that green infrastructure represents natural or ecological

resources, as shown in the Natural England research, but also supports the application

of sustainable/green ideas such as cycle paths The continuum thus provides options

for green infrastructure practitioners to deliver a diverse range of benefits to a range

of development issues including roadside verges (Marcucci & Jordan, 2013), effective

water management (Philadelphia Water Department, 2011), climate change (Gill

et al., 2007; Goode, 2006) or meeting public health needs (Town & Country Planning

Association, 2012b) Green infrastructure can, as a consequence, be described as

everything and nothing It also provides opportunities for planners, developers and

practitioners to look at urban and landscape issues from alternative perspectives,

which can be considered a positive process

One further issue that requires a brief reflection at this juncture is the use of green

infrastructure terminology Green infrastructure draws on ideas and language from

a number of disciplines (e.g landscape ecology, geography and planning), and as a

consequence utilises a range of synonyms to describe what it is This includes the use

of urban greening, urban green spaces, green spaces and to a lesser extent

ecosys-tems and ecosystem services (Mell, 2010) All of these have specific meanings other

than those addressed specifically within the green infrastructure literature However,

in the same manner that greenways and garden cities (see Chapter 2) are examined,

each of these terms has helped to frame our interpretations of green infrastructure

thinking For example, in India the use of green infrastructure is still embryonic As

an alternative the Indian government and practitioners use green space as their key

term for describing green infrastructure practice (Nagendra et al., 2010) Likewise, in

North America the focus on water management, stormwater retention and

mitiga-tion installs green infrastructure with a set of water-centric/engineered terminology

Finally, in continental Europe the use of green structure planning and not green

infra-structure still dominates in some locations, e.g Germany (European Commission,

2012; Liebenath et al., 2010) Each of these alternative understandings can be

described as focusing on the broader process of investment and discussion of green

infrastructure development Therefore, although green infrastructure will be used

most frequently to describe these practices, other terms, such as those mentioned

above, will also appear within the text

1.3 Why is green infrastructure development important?

The rapidity of urban development has meant that landscape professionals have,

in many locations, acted reactively to manage change With an increasing

under-standing of the drivers and impacts of climate change, landscape planners have

looked to alternative solutions to establish more sustainable landscape practice The rise of green infrastructure has coincided with this process, helping its advocates

to establish the concept as a ‘go-to’ process (Mell, 2014) One key assumption in this process is the notion that there is a flexibility to green infrastructure planning that enables its users to address a range of development scenarios simultaneously (Ahern, 2013; Horwood, 2011; Wright, 2011) Water management, biodiversity conservation, health inequalities, as well as climate change, are all areas where a

green infrastructure approach has been successfully applied (Boyle et al., 2013) The

flexibility of green infrastructure, therefore, reduces the reliance on a small number

of established investment options, providing landscape planners with versatility often unseen in development (Mell, 2013a)

Green infrastructure planning can also be applied at a number of scales, and thus offers a flexible approach to investment; promoting cross-boundary collabora-tion aids the establishment of multi-functional landscape resources International policy, such as the Water Framework Directive, is one example of this where green infrastructure practitioners have made extensive use of spatial characteristics to stra-tegically scope management at a regional and landscape scale (Ahern, 2007; Hering

et al., 2010) Due to the versatility that is explicit within green infrastructure planning

it can (and has) provide opportunities for planners at a local, metropolitan and regional scale to work effectively across administrative and legal boundaries (Natural

sub-England & Landuse Consultants, 2009; Tzoulas et al., 2007) In such cases green

infrastructure investments can be presented as an approach to landscape resource management that promotes the use of landscape networks, thus, saving time and money for the developers and the public through an integrated approach to

investment (Boyle et al., 2013; Roe & Mell, 2013)

Policy focused on green infrastructure also draws on a number of established green space planning ideas The integration of landscape ecology principles (net-works, capacity building), greenways (connectivity, multiple benefits) and garden cities (integrated planning, urban greening) – all of which are discussed further in

Chapter 2 – provide green infrastructure with its conceptual foundation They also

embed within green infrastructure thinking a set of established delivery practices that

can be drawn upon to promote the delivery of multi-functional landscape

invest-ment (Ahern, 1995; Fábos, 2004; Forman, 1995; Howard, 2009) An analysis of

greenways and garden cities also illustrates that the principles of green infrastructure

may not be new, but presents a cyclical re-evaluation of the notions of integrated

and sustainable approaches to planning (Davies et al., 2006; Mell, 2010) Green

infrastructure planning is therefore a contemporary form of landscape planning that

works within the parameters of existing approaches but reframes them to address

more contemporary issues

1.4 Who is leading the development and management

of green infrastructure?

One of the central questions discussed in green infrastructure research is who is

involved with the visioning, development and management of investments? Across

the world we see a range of stakeholders drawn from government,

non-governmen-tal practice, academia and the general public involved in the development of green

infrastructure (Benedict & McMahon, 2006) Invariably this leads to a complex

inter-play of investment agendas and perspectives, which has, at times, led to disjointed

implementation In each of the geographical areas discussed in this book, a broad

set of actors holds important roles in the promotion and management of green

infra-structure; some at a national scale, e.g in the USA, others at a city scale, e.g Paris

and Milan (Beatley, 2000; Hansen et al., 2015) In each case study the mechanisms

that facilitate engagement with green infrastructure are discussed, highlighting the

specific responsibilities that actors have in promoting policy formation and

imple-mentation (Horwood, 2011; Kambites & Owen, 2006; Mazza et al., 2011) What is

clear within each example is that involvement with green infrastructure planning is a

Figure 1.8 Town Moor,

public green space, Newcastle, UK

fluid process that explicitly requires trans-disciplinary working in order to explore the most cost-effective and positive socio-ecological outcomes of development.For instance, in the UK green infrastructure was initially promoted at the sub-regional level by local planning authorities (LPAs), England’s Community Forests and the Countryside Agency, who established the initial tentative framework for invest-ment (Blackman & Thackray, 2007; Countryside Agency & Groundwork, 2005) In subsequent years, changes in central government funding, revocation of landscape policy and a movement towards a more ‘localised’ approach to green infrastruc-ture has seen the number of engaged stakeholders diversify Currently, in 2014/15, Natural England, the Forestry Commission, the National Health Service (NHS) and the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG – the government department tasked with managing planning) are all actively discussing the value

of green infrastructure We can therefore ask how such national-scale bodies are integrated into the development and delivery of policy when practice varies so dramatically between locations What we can suggest is that to effectively manage development there is a need for greater levels of cooperation, by all bodies, and at a number of scales (Abbott, 2012; Allen III, 2012) Furthermore, despite the influence

of the bodies and other professional/campaigning agencies in the UK, including the Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI), the Landscape Institute (LI) and the Town & Country Planning Association (TCPA), successful green infrastructure projects appear

to retain a sub-national focus

In two of the case studies presented – Cambridgeshire and the London 2012 Olympic Games site – this process has been key to the successful investment in green infrastructure Both involved a number of similar stakeholders – LPAs, key environ-ment agencies (e.g Natural England or Environment Agency) – yet the development

of the delivery objectives was structured to meet different needs As a consequence, the involvement of private investors in London helped to shape the development

of the Olympic Park in a different way to the publically funded scoping and delivery

of green infrastructure in Cambridgeshire Establishing an understanding of who is

Figure 1.9 Green–blue

infrastructure, Belfast

(UK).

involved, as well as their primary motivations for investing in green infrastructure,

provides us with a more in-depth knowledge of why certain companies or

agen-cies align themselves with investment in urban greening (Town & Country Planning

Organisation & Government of India, Ministry of Urban Development, 2014)

We must also be prepared to accept that the process of investment in green

infra-structure does not follow a linear trajectory Due to the variation in administrative

and legislative responsibility, the development of green infrastructure shows subtle

but distinctive differences between locations (Amati & Taylor, 2010; Mell, 2009; TEP,

2005) Even within a single county, for instance the USA, the process of policy-making

and implementation shows a level of fluidity that some say may undermine the

ration-ale for investment (Mell, 2014) However, despite such variation in the interpretation

of what, how and why green infrastructure is needed, the case study chapters

illus-trate how the support of a strong, and in many cases politically influential, advocacy

arena help to equalise the disparity between focus and implementation

1.5 Structure of the book

Each of the issues noted in the previous sections will be addressed throughout the

following chapters, framing the way the book is presented, which is set out in three

sections First, the initial chapters present an overview of what green infrastructure is,

how it is being developed and where the concept has come from This will explore the

Figure 1.10 Bryant Park, New York (USA) Figure 1.11 Cyclepath, Kings Cross London (UK).

development of a number of key green infrastructure principles: connectivity, able landscape planning, multi-functionality, integrated and proactive development management, and how these have been embedded within landscape management debates It also reflects on how the political, legislative and economic structures of a location influence how green infrastructure is discussed

sustain-Chapter 3 presents the conceptual framework that underpins the tion of case study materials The framework sets out why the case studies were selected, how each example is evaluated and how we identify successful invest-ment in green infrastructure To achieve this, the development context of the case studies is described, identifying the range of green infrastructure resources utilised in each location, and makes judgements on the delivery of a broad range

evalua-of multi-functional benefits Second, the socio-economic context is assessed to highlight the main drivers of change in each area This reflects upon how green infrastructure is presented as a delivery objective in the investment priorities of

an area Such an analysis contextualises the decisions made by local government

in terms of what investment is promoted, and makes judgements of what the longer-term impacts of such opportunities are

Third, the socio-economic and environmental factors which influence ment in each location are reviewed against the normative approaches to landscape planning This illustrates how green infrastructure investment is presented within the political actions (and policy) of each case study location, assessing the impact this has on the form, focus and success of development For example, in the USA there

develop-is a predominant process of water-centric green infrastructure investment, framed within US governmental and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) guidelines, which influences the focus of delivery These processes will be discussed, highlight-ing the complexity of situating investment for green infrastructure in a variable socio-political environment

Each of the case studies presented draws on a number of policy/guidance sources,

as well as evidence from delivery organisations to illustrate what investment has taken place, and whether or not it should be considered successful In each example the three aspects of physical, socio-economic and political influence are reflected upon to evaluate how the context (size and location), the investment/development programme (stakeholders, policy/guidance, budget) and the challenges of invest-

ing in green infrastructure are subject to a number of explicit and implicit planning

constraints Running through each case study are a series of reflective questions that will be used to assess the value of investment in green infrastructure These include:

• Why and what green infrastructure is being developed?

• What is the value of green infrastructure development in this location?

• Which stakeholders are engaged in the process of green infrastructure ment and why?

develop-• What funding is being used to support investment in green infrastructure?

• What has worked and what can be improved?

Each question provides a lens through which best practice in green infrastructure delivery can be highlighted It also provides continuity between the case studies by

illustrating whether specific development and management factors can be

con-sidered transferable between scales and locations This is an important issue, as

although green infrastructure has a set of grounded principles, there is less certainty

on how these ideas can be delivered The analysis presented in each case study and

in the concluding summary goes on to identify what and how investment in green

infrastructure can be considered to be globally successful

The second half of the book presents a series of case studies examining the

development and value of green infrastructure across the world Using evidence

of government policy formation and action, as well as non-governmental agency

investments in green infrastructure, the case studies look at the nuanced forms

that green infrastructure development takes This extends the thematic approach

outlined in Chapter 3, highlighting how geographically specific green

infrastruc-ture practices reflect the wider socio-political nainfrastruc-ture of each site This includes a

discussion of the political structures which support its use, the funding mechanisms

used to achieve these goals, and the actual focus of delivery to highlight whether

transferable practices can be identified

The case studies have been selected based on their alternative approaches to

investment in green infrastructure A number of these locations have been reported

as leading the global discussion on investment in green infrastructure, e.g Chicago

(Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, 2014), and have reported innovative

delivery programmes explaining how this should be approached Examples have

been selected from regions with longer histories of green infrastructure practice (UK,

USA and Europe), as well as from those regions where the development of urban

greening is more recent (India and China) Each case study also highlights the

com-plexities that exist for landscape managers who are investing in green infrastructure

For example, in the UK, Cambridgeshire was a leading region which developed

green infrastructure policy in the mid-2000s, while the London 2012 Olympic Games

provided the city with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to invest in an

internation-ally important green infrastructure project In the USA, Chicago’s approach to a

metropolitan (and peri-metropolitan) green infrastructure/greenways development

is looking at the wider implications of effective water/urban greening management

European examples offer greater insights into the interactivity of historical

invest-ments in green infrastructure with more contemporary forms of urban landscape

management Each example highlights the variation in the form that green

infra-structure takes, which is particularly relevant when the density and space constraints

of European cities are considered

The Asian cities presented highlight the growing value of green infrastructure

in rapidly developing locations In New Delhi and the National Capital Territory

(NCT), the rate of expansion is placing exhaustive pressures on the capacity of the

environment to remain environmentally sustainable In contrast, Ahmedabad is a

smaller, less expansive and newer city where growth is less aggressive This case

study discusses how green infrastructure is being used to provide a platform for

long-term sustainable landscape planning The case study from Shanghai–Suzhou

brings together each of the factors illustrated in Europe, the USA and India, where

growth, socio-economic development and environmental-political interactions with

the landscape hold a central role in the development of green infrastructure

The final section draws together the key messages of each case study to explore how green infrastructure planning can continue to develop This section presents examples of where green infrastructure has been successfully implemented, high-lighting practices which could be considered as internationally transferable It also includes a discussion of which physical characteristics are important, how socio-economic variables can be managed and how both of these issues can be moderated within the politicised arena of landscape planning One further aspect of this pro-cess will be a reflection on how practice can inform the continuing evolution of green infrastructure as a conceptual approach to landscape planning This draws

on the case study material to identify whether modifications to the key principles and approaches to green infrastructure are needed In summary, the following book presents a synthesis of a decade of global green infrastructure discussion illustrating

where progress has been made in how and why we use the concept, and where

future opportunities for investment lie

The antecedents of green infrastructure

Olmsted, Howard and beyond

In 2006 Davies et al (2006: 5) suggested that green infrastructure might be simply

old wine in a new bottle The suggestion that green infrastructure is nothing new has never really prompted much of a response from its advocates They simply highlight that it re-interprets the most appropriate elements of different green space planning

techniques, reframing them as the integrated approach known as green ture Green infrastructure is therefore not revolutionary and it has not developed out

infrastruc-of the blue What it is, though, is a more nuanced form infrastruc-of understanding between people, place and the environment, which helps its advocates to view develop-ment (and management) through a more holistic perspective (Benedict & McMahon, 2006) Duly, green infrastructure could be seen as a chameleon within planning, which enables its user to diversify its emphasis to suit the context of a specific development Should this be considered a problem? At its very essence, planning – and within the context of green infrastructure, landscape planning – is a process

of evolution, not stagnation (Isserman, 2014) Any debate of green infrastructure thus reflects, at least in part, the antecedents that have supported its development The following chapter draws on this rich history1 to illustrate where a number

of the key conceptual principles supporting green infrastructure have been adapted from This covers green space planning discussions in the UK, North America and Europe, illustrating the complexity faced by the early green infrastructure research-ers as they attempted to find a common lineage between diverse places, alternative approaches to delivery, historical antecedents and the fluency of planning pol-icy-implementation systems around the world Examples from the UK cities are discussed to show how our current reflections on society and place were developed (Cullingworth & Nadin, 2006; Town & Country Planning Association, 2012a), review-ing the value of garden cities and green belt designations and their influence on the spatial form of green infrastructure (Amati & Taylor, 2010; Thomas & Littlewood, 2010) From North America the work of Frederick Law Olmsted is presented, high-lighting how the ‘greenway’ movement promoted landscape connectivity, increasing access and multi-functionality in cities (Ahern, 1995; Fábos, 2004) This chapter also briefly introduces how the reconstruction of some of Europe’s cities have more recently utilised various aspects of what we now call ‘green infrastructure’ as a sign

of public responsibility to promote livability and urban sustainability All of which leads us to the present-day musings on the development of sustainable commu-nities in the UK, USA and further afield in places like India, and the rise of green

urbanism as a form of environmental management (Beatley, 2000; Benton-Short

& Short, 2007; Lehmann, 2011) These discussions are supported by a review of biodiversity planning, landscape ecology and ecosystem services approaches to envi-ronmental management that have been embedded into green infrastructure This provides its advocates with a set of spatial principles to guide their understanding of green infrastructure and the delivery of multiple benefits across landscape bounda-ries (Hansen & Pauleit, 2014; Young, 2010) One further dimension that is integrated into these discussions is an understanding of water within green infrastructure think-ing The following discusses how water is explored in different green infrastructure arenas, highlighting its influence on landscape planning This is of significant rel-evance in the USA, where water-centric investment in urban greening is the most frequently applied form of green infrastructure (Ahern, 2007; Hansen, 2013) What each of these approaches brings to this book is an insight into how green space planning has changed over time They also hint at the links between historic approaches to green space management and more recent practices, such as com-munity forestry and green urbanism, in the shaping of green infrastructure (Mell, 2010) Just as landscape architects, like Olmsted, and philanthropists such as Howard endeavoured to rethink how we envision, develop and manage our cities, green infrastructure thinking has provided us with an ability to rethink our relationship and the value we find in landscapes (Davies, 2014; Herrington, 2009) Green infra-structure researchers have therefore mined planning history to highlight the positive aspects of these approaches, which have subsequently been engaged with by green infrastructure advocates Such a process of evaluation that meets the needs of spe-cific locations has thus provided green infrastructure planners with a versatility, as noted by Wright (2011) and Mell (2011a; 2013a), that can be considered as one of the most important aspects of its use This chapter returns to this issue at regular junctures, assessing how various green space approaches have been reimagined as the basis for green infrastructure planning

Each of the green infrastructure principles or antecedents presented in this ter also highlights the complexity associated with developing landscapes Due to the variability of understanding between academics, policy-makers and practitioners there has not been, to date, a unified consensus developed for how we should plan for landscape resources We therefore need to debate green infrastructure as both

chap-a sum of its pchap-arts chap-and chap-as chap-an inherently context-specific chap-approchap-ach (Wright, 2011) As

a consequence, the ambition discussed by Mell (2010) to create consensus for green infrastructure between disciplines and locations is often fraught with ambiguity and subtleties, which have proved difficult to mitigate One example of this is shown in

Table 2.1, where a range of constraints influencing green infrastructure planning

in the UK and USA are highlighted (Mell, 2014) These suggest that although there

is a level of consistency to green infrastructure discussions in different locations, there are nuanced understandings or applications of the concepts and principles

in different locales This also reflects the variation in project/delivery focus, support and outputs that green infrastructure has been imbued with in different contexts Our understanding of these subtleties has changed as we become more aware of the influence that historical planning discussions have on current policy-practice dis-course (McHarg, 1969; Selman, 2009) This is a recurring theme throughout as the

evidence of green infrastructure development is contextualised alongside planning

praxis The following sections trace the lineages of green infrastructure, providing a

historical context to its development and use in landscape planning

2.1 Parkways and greenways

One of the most instrumental approaches that shaped green infrastructure was

the development of parkways and greenways Greenways are linear features,

pre-dominately constructed of environmental features (e.g trails) that originally aimed

to facilitate movement from urban areas into the wider landscapes and countryside

(Fábos, 2004) Developed first in the USA, they have subsequently been utilised

around the world The continued use of greenways as a cost-effective approach to

landscape management reflects the growing calls for increased accessibility to nature

by urban dwellers from the late 1800s onwards (Little, 1990) Greenways, therefore,

keyed into a widening participation or interactivity with the landscape that was being

requested as leisure time and access to transport made distance less onerous for

urban populations As a consequence, people were able to explore the countryside

more easily, especially where accessible nature was located in close proximity to

urban centres, required less of a pioneering spirit to visit and was facilitated by the

implementation of organised trails (Little, 1990)

The development of these landscape features has been described as occurring in

two eras: first, an era of expansion focusing on the development of boulevards and

Table 2.1 Barriers to green infrastructure development

Support of other sectors (i.e transport,

sanitation or housing)

Political/financial Delivery expertise/capacity Financial/political 

Capacity of resource base to accept/

support development

Public responses to development Political/financial  

Source: adapted from Mell, 2014 Based on: Lennon, 2014a; Roe & Mell, 2013; Boyle et al.,

2013; Mell, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2013a; Lerner & Allen, 2012; Byrne, Lo & Jianjun 2015; South

Yorkshire Forest Partnership & Sheffield City Council, 2012; Allen III, 2012; Siemens AG, 2011;

UNEP-WCMC, 2011; Horwood, 2011; Wright, 2011; Beatley, 2000; 2009; Natural England and

Landuse Consultants, 2009; Schilling & Logan, 2008; Tzoulas et al., 2007; Ahern, 2007; Gill

et al., 2007; Kambites & Owen, 2006; Weber et al., 2006; Benedict & McMahon, 2002; 2006;

Hellmund & Smith, 2006; Little, 1990

parkways, which was followed by a second era that aimed to establish trail-oriented recreational greenways (Fábos, 2004) The current use of greenways extended these objectives to develop multi-functional networks promoting a range of recreational,

economic and environmental benefits (Lindsey et al., 2001) Potentially the most

famous greenway development presented in the literature was constructed in Boston

Figure 2.1a Boston

Common, Boston (USA)

Figure 2.1b Boston

Back Bay Fens, Boston

(USA).

by Frederick Law Olmsted to aid the city’s adaption to its specific New England

cli-mate Boston’s Emerald Necklace covers an area of over 1,100 acres (4.5 km2) and

was designed, in part, to manage the ice/snow melt of the Charles River, which led to

annual flooding (Benedict & McMahon, 2006) The success of this investment helped

the city of Boston to limit some of the negative impacts of urbanisation through the

development of a constructed wetland system The investment also brought

exten-sive socio-economic benefits to the city, with Boston Common acting as a hub for

community activities, which is still the case today (Fábos, 2004)

Following the success of Boston’s investment, a number of North American

cit-ies, including Indianapolis (Lindsey et al., 2001), Toronto (Macdonald & Keil, 2012)

and Montreal (Taylor et al., 1995) all benefited from greenway-led regeneration

Moreover, in Vancouver the staging of the Expo ’86 and the Winter Olympics in 2010

enabled the city to work with local communities to revitalise the inner harbour area,

utilising linear parks and cycle/walking paths linking downtown with the wider

met-ropolitan area (Fábos, 1995; Holden et al., 2008) Each of these cities has, however,

approached the development and management of greenways in different ways

This reflects the inherent variation visible in greenway design and, as Little (1990)

proposed, they fall into five distinct categories of investment, namely:

Urban–ripar-ian corridors, recreational greenways, ecological corridors, scenic and historic routes

and comprehensive networks, a number of which will be discussed in Chapter 4’s

discussion on Atlanta

Each of these classifications can be identified in the literature as providing

alternative outcomes for greenway planning (Hellmund & Smith, 2006) Therefore,

although Little’s prescriptive system offers an insight into how greenways were

his-torically developed, we can assume that contemporary investments utilise more

than one type Moreover, in areas where greenways have a shorter history, this

pattern becomes increasingly evident – for example in China (C Xu et al., 2011),

the UK (Walmsley, 2006) and Europe (Beatley, 2012; Haaland & Gyllin, 2009), where

researchers and planners discussed the variations they have experienced when

work-ing across disciplinary boundaries to achieve investment It may be prudent to move

beyond Little’s classification and promote the use of a ‘features-led’ understanding of

greenways, which may indicate a greater relevance to green infrastructure planning

Within the contemporary greenways literature the following principles have been

used to extend Little’s discussion, as well as those by Ahern (1995) and Jongman

and Pungetti (2004): linear features that are spatially applied at different scales,

which promote connectivity between people and place, and support a wide range

of socio-economic and ecological benefits (Taylor et al., 1995; Hellmund & Smith,

2006; Ryan et al., 2006) Each has been used to promote a deeper understanding

of greenways and identify the key elements, e.g connectivity, that are integrated

into green infrastructure planning

2.2 Garden cities and sustainable communities

While greenways can be seen as a key precursor to green infrastructure planning in

North America, they have been less significant in the UK Alternatively, UK planners

have drawn more frequently on the principles of the garden cities movement to

frame these debates The relationship between garden cities and green infrastructure has been explored extensively by the Town & Country Planning Association (TCPA) (see Town & Country Planning Association, 2012a; 2012b) The principles proposed

by Ebenezer Howard, the instigator of the garden cities movement, reflected the civic need to address a range of socio-economic and health and well-being issues

in the late 1800s (Howard, 2009) He went further and advocated for the ment of a large number of smaller and more compact cities close to large urban

develop-centres, which he called garden cities Howard’s development of the garden

cit-ies principles offered a ‘peaceful path to social reform’ (Fishman, 1982: 32) that attempted to place social equity at the centre of urban development His ‘three-magnets’2 approach to integrating the civic duties of the town with the accessibility and amenity value of the county restructured the ways that urban areas could be built (Hall, 2002) The vision for Howard’s garden cities therefore aimed to reinstall the critical link between health and well-being and human–environment interactivity (Howard, 2009)

Howard’s vision echoed the design principles of Olmsted in Boston and New York, where Olmsted had wanted ‘a ground to which people may easily go after their day’s work is done’ (Olmsted quoted in Hiss 1990: 44) Howard’s three magnets presents

a key indicator of how he envisaged linking people, place (socio-economic) and the landscape (environmental) in his vision This highlights both the positive and negative attributes of urban and rural life, promoting a view that by integrating the urban and the rural simultaneously, the benefits would outweigh the problems of moving away from large urban centres (Howard, 2009) Howard thus aimed to incorporate the functional elements of urban and rural landscapes into his designs to achieve greater liveability and multi-functionality

Unfortunately, only a small number of Garden Cities were realised, with Letchworth and Welwyn being the first developments which were specifically planned to inte-grate Howard’s principles (Town & Country Planning Association, 2012a) Both cities were designed to strategically invest in accessible public space close to homes and centres of employment This, as Howard observed, provided the physical/landscape framework of spaces that would, through proximity and accessibility, encourage people to spend more time in public green spaces Howard’s proposals also pro-moted a preventive approach to public health which addressed the need to provide

a high-quality public realm alongside adequate housing provision to minimise the risk of spreading communicable disease (Hall, 2002; Howard, 2009)

Current development policies in the UK are now revisiting Howard’s garden cities ideals.3 Strong advocacy from the TCPA has informed government that the principles proposed by Howard (Fishman, 1982) are as relevant today as they were in 1898 (Town & Country Planning Association, 2012a) Evidence from the health literature, and in particular the research investigating obesogenic environments, reinforces these messages, highlighting that the form of the built environment directly influ-

ences the ways people interact with it (Booth et al., 2005; Lake & Townshend, 2006)

The provision of spaces that promote outdoor living, social interaction and an est in the natural environment are becoming increasingly grounded and support positive interpretations of the relationship between green infrastructure and health (Town & Country Planning Association, 2012c)

inter-While the debates supporting garden cities are ongoing in the UK, there has been

a further, if limited, evolution of these ideas within the sustainable communities

literature Promoted extensively during the New Labour (1997–2010) administration

in the UK, sustainable communities were proposed as a contemporary application

of Howard’s garden cities (Urban Task Force, 1999) Sustainable communities were

proposed as a policy mechanism addressing a wide range of socio-economic and

ecological problems in the UK’s urban areas Barton (2000) supported this

assess-ment, noting that before development can be undertaken a review of communities’

needs must be conducted to understand how best to sustain a community in the

long term Through a more directed engagement with communities, the Office of

the Deputy Prime Minister (ODPM) proposed to improve social cohesion through the

delivery of more appropriate forms of public investment (Office of the Deputy Prime

Minister, 2003; 2002a) This included improving participation in development, the

delivery of more efficient services and the promotion of a multi-functional urban

landscape (Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, 2005a, 2005b) The role of green

infrastructure in this process was to facilitate a more inviting and interactive landscape

that people could use as quotidian space The ODPM viewed the poor quality of the

urban fabric of the UK as undermining the prospects for growth and thus worked to

re-establish a sense of value and pride in these places (Raco, 2005) The outcomes

of the programme, however, were relatively short-lived With the election of the

Conservative–Liberal Democrat Government in 2010, funding for the programme

was cut Moreover, although elements of the programme remain embedded within

the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) (Department of Communities and

Local Government, 2012), the breadth of the delivery objectives has been minimised

2.3 Green belts

While current reflections on the delivery of sustainable communities may limit the

inclusion of green infrastructure, there is a far more vocal discussion concerning

green belts As a mechanism to slow coalescence, they were first used in the UK after

the Second World War to ensure that the expansion and redevelopment of London

did not subsume the greater South-east of England (Hall & Tewdwr-Jones, 2010)

At the centre of green belt discussions is a notion that they provide policy-makers

with a simple and discreet form of environmental protection that provides spatial

clarity to what can and cannot be developed (Rydin, 2003) Alongside the defence of

London, a programme of green belt designations was created that provided further

protection for a number of cities, including Oxford, Cambridge and Birmingham, as

well as along the Liverpool–Manchester–Leeds corridor These designations provided

spatially significant reserves of greenfield and agricultural land from development

to ensure that ‘town’ and ‘county’ remained distinguishable (Cullingworth & Nadin,

2006) In terms of green infrastructure planning, green belts, along with National

Park designations in the UK, offer the most significant protection to landscape

resources in the country Green belts are, as a consequence, considered sacrosanct to

many in the UK, promoting a policy framework that ensures that perceived

environ-mental integrity of the countryside remains visible, but raises a number of dilemmas

for green infrastructure planners

First, they are landscape-scale resources which offer a contiguous form of green infrastructure around our major cities Given the promotion of the Countryside In and Around Towns (CIAT) agenda by Countryside Agency and Groundwork (2005)

in the early to mid 2000s, green belts were seen as an essential stepping-stone viding protection from development (Rydin, 2003) However, the location of these

pro-resources and their ecological and social value is contested (Gallent et al., 2008)

We therefore need to consider whether mono-functional green belt land is able The arguments for and against green belts though are not this simple, yet the issue of spatial distribution and retention remain central to green belt discussions

valu-A second issue relates to the rate of proposed housing development in the UK versus the availability of high-quality or locationally appropriate land, which is seen to be out of balance (Morrison, 2010)

There have been several calls (Cullingworth & Nadin, 2006; Gallent et al., 2008;

Gilg, 1996) to relax the green belt designations to free up land for housing However, this can be considered as a very simplistic argument given that developers are sell-ing the value of green infrastructure as a ‘green and pleasant’ living environment (Rydin, 2003) Furthermore, from a green infrastructure perspective there is an issue over the conversion of green spaces (including agricultural land) to housing, unless there is sufficient compensation or off-setting of the negative change in land use Third, green belts have not always been managed effectively as multi-functional green infrastructure As noted above, many fail to fully understand the lack of ecosystem

or human value visible in these locations (Amati & Taylor, 2010) As a consequence, although environmental agencies including Natural England and the Wildlife Trust are attempting to improve the functionality of green belt areas, there is still an established level of opposition to such uses (see Natural England & Landuse Consultants, 2009) Each of these issues raises doubts over whether green belts are an effective form

of green infrastructure investment and management Although they are similar ceptually (and in a sense spatially) to greenways, there is a greater scrutiny of the activities undertaken in green belts, potentially limiting their capacity to act as multi-functional resources Therefore, although the spatial distribution of green belts in

con-Figure 2.2 Green belt

in Merseyside (UK).

the UK provides a protected resource within the UK landscape (approximately 13 per

cent of land cover), their functional value could be contested (Cullingworth & Nadin,

2006) However, despite the issues and ongoing discussions of the suitability of green

belts, they are still in force in the UK and other locations In Ahmedabad (India), the

city’s green belt was used to ensure that agricultural land is not converted to

resi-dential or industrial uses This policy was rescinded in the most recent development

plan as it had been suggested by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) that

its enforcement was unmanageable (Ahmedabad Urban Development Authority,

2013) More positively, the Canadian capital, Ottawa, has a long-established green

belt around the city, while the Greater Toronto Area and Niagara Peninsula have

placed an emphasis on managing the Golden Horseshoe green belt (Fitzsimons

et al., 2012; Taylor et al., 1995) The European Union is also attempting to develop

a pan-European network of linear green belts running north–south and east–west

across its member states to ensure environmental resources are protected (European

Commission, 2013; Terry et al., 2006) One of the central issues to remember within

this process is the notion that landscape-scale linear or circular green infrastructure

resources should be designated and protected to maintain a significant proportion of

the landscape from development (Benedict & McMahon, 2006; Davies et al., 2006)

2.4 Community forestry in England

The foundations of greenways, garden cities and green belts are at the centre of how

green infrastructure is developed spatially Each of these approaches also supports a

number of the key principles underpinning the development of landscape and urban

greening, such as connectivity They have, however, been applied in a number of

different ways to meet localised needs In the UK the main driver of this process has

been the Community Forest Partnerships

Green infrastructure in the UK was, and is, indebted to England’s Community

Forest Partnerships for their endeavours to develop the concept from the mid-2000s

onwards (Mell, 2011b) From its initial conception, the Community Forest Partnerships

have been the most actively engaged advocacy body working to establish green

infrastructure Their role was one of exploration and development Working under

contract to the Countryside Agency (now Natural England) and a number of local

government bodies, they took the initial steps in identifying the main principles of

green infrastructure They produced evidence of how green infrastructure could act

as a connective network of spaces promoting multi-functionality across urban and

rural landscapes (see Davies et al., 2006), and responded to the discussion of the

CIAT (Countryside Agency & Groundwork, 2005) and the Accessible Natural Green

Space Standards (ANGSt) agenda (Pauleit et al., 2003) They also built on the work

of English Nature and Natural England, reviewing how proximity and accessibility are

essential elements of multi-functional green spaces (Mell, 2010; Schrijnen, 2000)

One important facet of their role has been evidence gathering From 2004 to 2010

the community forests worked with the Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) in

England to provide a rationale for investment in green infrastructure through the

Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS) process (Mell, 2011b; 2010) Following the change

of government in the UK in 2010, the RSS framework (and their strategic policy

objectives) was revoked, yet the community forests maintained their ery functions to ensure that green infrastructure remained in the political spotlight The most successful partnership in this process has been the Mersey Forest, who have sustained their relationship with green infrastructure development throughout this period While other forest partnerships (e.g North-East Community Forest) have either ceased to trade or been forced to diversify, the Mersey Forest has remained

research/deliv-a resolute force (Mell, 2011b; Mersey Forest, 2013research/deliv-a) Other presearch/deliv-artnerships, including the South Yorkshire Forest Partnership and the Red Rose Forest, have also been successful in promoting green infrastructure, although they could be considered

to have been less successful in positioning themselves as key policy-practice ery agents compared to the Mersey Forest Both were involved with the Valuing Attractive Landscapes in the Urban Economy (VALUE) programme, which produced

deliv-a set of proposdeliv-als for the economic vdeliv-aludeliv-ation of green infrdeliv-astructure; work which

has subsequently been promoted at a national and EU level (Mell et al., 2013; South

Yorkshire Forest Partnership & Sheffield City Council, 2012) Over the course of the last decade (2005–2015), England’s community forests could be considered to have established themselves as the main agents supporting the conceptual development and delivery of green infrastructure in the UK

2.5 Green urbanism and biophilia

As green infrastructure thinking has developed, its application has taken on the principles of a number of additional approaches to landscape planning Jack Ahern

of the University of Massachusetts (Amherst, USA) was one such innovator who engaged the principles of green urbanism with research on green infrastructure He, and others such as Rob Ryan (also of the University of Massachusetts) and Maggie Roe (Newcastle University, UK), have therefore worked to extend the evolution of the concept into its current form

Figure 2.3 Herrington

Country Park,

Sunderland (UK)

Although green urbanism ideas have been predominately associated with the

work of Beatley (2012, 2009, 2000) and Lehmann (2011), the principles they

pro-pose are also relevant to green infrastructure debates Green urbanism promotes the

notion that urban areas should attempt to moderate their behaviour to reduce the

negative impacts on their ecological footprint, while acknowledging the interactivity

of different human–environment activities within urban ecosystems This view has

been extended to support the notion that cities should be designed to function in

ways analogous to nature; a view historically represented by McHarg (1969) These

discussions go further by suggesting that the principles of green urbanism can be

used to propose a more circular form of development that incorporate ecological

networks and ecosystem services thinking as key elements of its symbiotic

rela-tionship between people and the landscape (Beatley, 2012; Mell, 2010) Finally,

both Beatley and Lehmann stress the need to facilitate health lifestyles through

accessible and multi-functional green infrastructure investment, which in turn helps

create a better quality of life, place and environment The main argument proposed

within green urbanism is, therefore, one of circularity between people and place to

ensure that an integrated and sustainable form of landscape planning is possible

(Beatley, 2000)

Figure 2.4

Frederiksberg green space map, Copenhagen (Denmark)