The Vatican Climate Summit, titled “From Climate Crisis to Climate Resilience”, was successfully held in May 2024. A landmark achievement of the Summit was the introduction and adoption of the Planetary Protocol for Climate Change Resilience. This comprehensive framework calls for global cooperation to enhance climate resilience through the implementation of the MAST principles—mitigation, adaptation, and societal transformation, laying the groundwork for a strategic approach to climate action. Facing the current climate challenge, it is also crucial to understand the complexity of climate change, conduct climate design, and promote educational paradigm change for future global leadership in planet stewardship.
As global climate continues to change, it is pressing to integrate the carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals into territorial spatial planning. While little existing ecological restoration research focuses on counties in western China, particularly arid areas of northwest China, this research took Wensu County of the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region in China as the study case, evaluated the carbon sequestration capacity and carbon storage of the current carbon sinks, identified the spatial pattern of carbon sinks, and proposed the territorial ecological restoration approaches to increasing carbon sinks. The evaluation results show that the importance level of carbon sinks varies significantly across geographical environments of the county, where one primary carbon sink, two secondary carbon sinks, and potential carbon sinks with a total area of 2259.81 km2 were identified. This research extracted eight typical land use patterns based on current land use and proposed ecological restoration strategies accordingly. This research shows a way to integrate carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals in territorial spatial planning, which is instrumental for carbon sink management in the arid areas of northwest China and provides a referable paradigm for regions with similar geographical conditions.
● Focuses on ecological restoration in a county in the arid areas of northwest China, aiming for carbon sink increase ● Evaluates the carbon sequestration and storage patterns of current carbon sinks in the study area and identifies the spatial pattern of carbon sink importance level ● Extracts typical land use patterns based on current land use and proposes ecological restoration strategies accordingly
As a highly urbanized bay area bustling with socio-economic activities, Shenzhen Bay is a pivotal stopover and wintering habitat for migratory birds along the East Asian-Australasian Flyway. The Futian Mangrove National Important Wetland, located in the northeast of Shenzhen bay, is a part of the Guangdong Neilingding–Futian National Nature Reserve. As the smallest national nature reserve in China, the wintering habitat of migratory birds has been significantly impacted by the compacted surrounding built-up environment. It has become an urgent need for refined high-quality ecological restoration for the habitats. This project leveraged Nature-based Solutions to develop a refined model for the ecological restoration of coastal wetland waterbird habitats in compact urban areas. By analyzing waterbird behaviors and habitat requirements, this model outlined six strategies: water surface expansion, water level control, hydrodynamic conditions improvement, shoal transformation, adaptive vegetation management, and disturbance control. To effectively guide the restoration implementation, high-, medium-, and low-adaptive approaches were proposed accordingly. After restoration in 2022, notable increases in target species, such as Platalea minor, were observed. The variety of waterbirds of the reserve in 2022 increased by 33% compared with 2021, while increased by 50.9% compared with 2016, significantly enhancing ecosystem services of the coastal area. As urban renewal in China is shifting towards spatial redevelopment, this model offers valuable insights for ecological restoration aiming at coastal wetland waterbird conservation across the country, and substantially supports establishing the "International Mangrove Center" in Shenzhen.
● Explores Nature-based Solutions on refined coastal wetland restoration in highly urbanized area ● Summarizes the universal habitat requirements for five categories of waterbirds ● Proposes six ecological restoration strategies for waterbird habitats and corresponding high-, medium-, and low-adaptive approaches
Urban green spaces contribute to improving people's physical and mental health by reducing levels of stress and anxiety. Marginalized communities in the USA experience poor health outcome in part because of health disparities related to social and structural determinants of health. The purpose of this study is to assess the prospective role of Kellogg Park, a newly built community park in a marginalized community in California, in enhancing residents' physical and mental health. The researchers collected the data by conducting an in-person survey, which covered questions related to environmental and safety perceptions, overall satisfaction, changes in physical activity changes and mental health with respondents' pre- and post-occupancy experiences. For analyzing data, bivariate analyses using a t-test and a correlation analysis were conducted to examine if there was a relationship between the overall satisfaction and visiting experience. The results indicated an increased positive environmental perception. Besides, respondents reported positively to questions of safety and their overall satisfaction. This research yielded positive results, indicating an improvement in the respondents' physical activity changes and mental health after the construction of the park. The results will advocate for and assist planners, designers, and policy-makers in prioritizing green spaces in marginalized communities.
● Reveals that increased physical and mental health was closely related to the accessibility of urban green spaces ● Finds that a close relationship existed between the overall satisfaction with the visit experience and that of the exercise equipment, safety of the park, and quality of the park ● Reveals that non-homeowners with children felt safer than homeowners with children about children playing at the park after its completion
Combining research methods such as semantic analysis and Space-Time Cube, this paper proposes a "historic urban landscape–cognition–sentiment" analysis framework, covering aspects of heritage intrinsic value, urban functional value, and urban landscape value, and reveals the influencing mechanism of the characteristics of historic urban landscape (HUL) on public sentiments and the spatio-temporal differentiation patterns through the case study of the Shaoxing ancient city in China. The research findings include that different HUL characteristics had differentiated effects on public sentiments, and the effect of a same HUL characteristic on public sentiments varied between weekdays and weekends/holidays, and among different HULs. On weekends/holidays, public sentiments were more influenced by the intrinsic value factors of HUL (e.g., heritage level, heritage age), whereas on weekdays, they were more affected by urban functional value factors, and urban landscape value factors played a greater role in arousing people's positive sentiments. This study aims to provide scientific references for enhancing public perception and emotional experience in urban spaces and for identifying potential spatial improvement opportunities in historic cities.
● Innovatively proposes "HUL–Cognition–Sentiment" analysis framework, and systematically explores the influencing mechanism of HUL characteristics on public sentiments ● Studies the spatio-temporal differentiation patterns of public sentiments from the dimensions of HUL intrinsic value, urban functional value, and urban landscape value ● On weekends/holidays, public sentiments were more influenced by the intrinsic value factors of HUL, while on weekdays were more affected by urban functional value and urban landscape value factors
The katsura tree at Dumbarton Oaks is among the oldest of the species in North America and pre-dates the design of the garden. Japanese master gardener Kurato Fujimoto was commissioned to inspect and lead the construction and installation of a series of branch supports, known as "hoozue" in Japan, to rejuvenate this venerable tree that was in decline. The assessment of the tree included the inspection of the branch structure with a projection toward post-installation growth over the next several decades. Materials such as rope, bark fabric, nails (kasugai), and the wooden hoozue themselves were fabricated and installed with indigenous knowledge and experience, which were described in the text and drawings and documented in a series of photographic sequences. This article narrates the process of this preservation work, demonstrating the significance of this indigenous Japanese technique.
● It studies an indigenous Japanese arboriculture technique that has time-tested success yet may be different from accepted practices ● It describes an entire installation process of Hoozue, which preserves and rejuvenates the aging katsura tree at Dumbarton Oaks that is one of the oldest of the species in North America ● The preservation work offers a model for the study of emerging branches of arboricultural research, indigenous cultural practices, plant humanities, etc.
