Submission of monitoring data (citizen observation)

The Institute of Landschaft and Freiraum together with Grün Stadt Zürich and ETH Zürich is developing a project on how plant biodiversity in the city of Zurich can be maintained through urban ecological design. In collaboration with the University of Lausanne, they will assess fragmentation effects on the species, functional and genetic diversity of wildflower patches, and, more specifically, on the population viability, evolutionary potential and connectivity of selected model species. These results will feed directly into the biodiversity programme at Zurich’s office of parks and open spaces (Grün Stadt Zürich). (Ref 1)

The association Codifas started its own initiative to inform citizens on the danger of practising traditional agriculture, and the advantages of sustainable agriculture. The initiative has been implemented by applying the concept of social inclusion, which means that young people from foreign countries (Ghana, Senegal etc.) were involved in the project and they helped to realize it. Together with the goal of social inclusion, the project has important benefits in terms of sustainable production and consumption. The whole area for cultivation has been divided into several plots, for those citizens who are willing to cultivate it. (Ref.1.)

This NBS comes as a reply against the municipality of Iasi which in 2013 cited lack of visibility and aesthetic preoccupation decided to cut over 100 linden trees and replace them with Japanese acacia in the city centre. The action enraged the inhabitants of the city who alongside local and national NGOs took the matter into their own hands and protested. As such in 2015 the municipality re-planted the linden trees (1).

The San Rafael Park is an urban park and commemoration site built over former communal graves containing more than 2000 bodies of victims of the Spanish Civil War and the Franquista regime. The large project has had 4 phases, three of which have been completed, including the building of a Historical Memory Pantheon to commemorate the victims in the communal graves exhumed from the grounds where the park now stands. (ref 1) In these phases are numerous reforestation and water preservation plans (ref 1-7) including the gardening of more than 4,000m² of green area with 104 shade trees, 8 palm trees and more than 400 units of shrubs, in addition to covering the rest of the surface with perennials and meadows (ref 3).

The rehabilitation of the main road Alameda Principal seeks to invert the previous distribution of use of space that saw 70% of it devoted to car usage and 30% to pedestrian use, after the intervention the situation should be 75% civilian and pedestrian space and 25% for cars. (Ref. 4,5) More public spaces, green areas, walks, bike lanes and leisure facilities will characterize this action, which also prioritizes highlighting the identity of this area of the city and value its architectural elements, patrimonial, wooded vault and cultural links. (Ref. 4)

The community garden is located in the midst of a housing quarter and in the city district of Grünau, a former Plattenbau-area and forms part of a wider area redevelopment project which turns former brownfield (from the DDR era) into generationally mixed housing units with higher living standards. The idea for the garden arose among its residents, who determined its design and elements. It consists of multi-use zones for young and old residents: a central square, a pond with special flora, plant beds for gardening and harvesting, a wild meadow for recreation and picnics (2,3).

The project of Nature Oasis Auwiesen is creating new habitats for animals and plants in Stuttgart. The project is one of a total of six “Neckar pearls” that are to be completed by 2022 as part of the Neckar Landscape Park master plan in Stuttgart. In the project with a predominantly ecological focus, grassland in the Neckaraue near the Aubrücke is to be transformed into a near‐natural, ecologically valuable wetland biotope. In the course of straightening the Neckar, the wet and floodplain biotopes that were typical and widespread in the floodplains have been lost. The aim of the project is to restore these habitats for animals and plants, which have become very rare today. A network of marshes, water surfaces, islands, and bushes is to be created in the district of Hofen. On an area previously used as grassland, new habitats will be created for rare animals and plants, which are dependent on water areas. Initially, the planned implementation time was 2016-2022, but now it has been delayed and is expected to start by the end of 2021. (2, 7).

The City of Milan intends to carry out a functional intervention in the valley of Ticinello for the strengthening of the environmental matrix and of the structural characteristics aimed at improving the ecological connection. The project, which aims to contribute to the valorisation, strengthening and conservation of the natural heritage, as well as expand local biodiversity, through the realization of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, is necessary for the realization, development and enhancement of large-scale ecological corridors already identified by the instruments of territorial planning (1).

Cardiff City Council and Urban Buzz brought together local organizations, community groups supporting wildlife, to create environments to encourage more bees, butterflies, hoverflies and other insects. (ref 1). One project inspired by Urban Buzz is Pharma Bee, a project housed and run by Cardiff University’s School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, that worked to create a bee-friendly campus through their PharmaBees team (ref 7). In association with Urban Buzz, a project run by BugLife, it renovated the Cardiff University’s Redwood Building by planting bee-friendly plants (ref 2), installed beehives and trained bee-keepers (ref 7). The efforts were then expanded to the Hayden Ellis building on Cardiff University's campus (ref 7).

"Walking pathway located on the banks of the river of the Arc which flows to the south of the city. It follows the meanders of the river and includes games for children, a fitness trail, meadows in the shade of tall trees that border the stream. It covers an area of 10 hectares." (Ref. 1)