On the contrary to what many believe; Rich biodiverse ecosystems can exist in cities. By recognizing and working actively to preserve and expand urban ecosystem services and biodiversity, cities get can better manage their climate-change adaptation.
On the contrary to what many believe; Rich biodiverse ecosystems can exist in cities. By recognizing and working actively to preserve and expand urban ecosystem services and biodiversity, cities get can better manage their climate-change adaptation.
In an era where urbanization continues to reshape our world, the importance of preserving and enhancing urban biodiversity has never been more critical.
The Biodiversity Alert feature, part of HUGSI.green, allows cities to pinpoint areas to protect and further develop to boost urban biodiversity.
Cities can also use the tool to identify vital connectors between these areas to allow for migration of species.
The information and maps provided help cities to understand where new connectors can be formed and through this, focus their efforts on greening where the highest biodiversity values can be achieved.
For city planners there are only three parameters that you can affect:
To understand biodiversity in cities you need to assess the quantity and quality of green space and the degree to which different areas are connected to each other.
To make vital measurements on urban biodiversity potential we have developed the following new KPIs that will be made available to all cities part of HUGSI.green. Annual monitoring of the cities allows us to highlight loss of areas important for biodiversity as well as indicate broken connections between such land. It shows
A. Nature potential score - the degree to which nature has a foothold in the city.
B. Nature connectivity score - the degree to which natural areas are connected to each other.
C. Biodiversity indicator score - a combined score of nature potential and nature connectivity.
Cities can through this analysis understand their vulnerable points, where a decrease in green space would harm the local ecosystem disproportionately as well as pinpointing areas where added vegetation would have most positive effect by connecting green areas.
