Green Infrastructure

Green Infrastructure (GI) is a network of (semi-) natural areas which can protect and enhance the services provided by ecosystems, while also benefiting biodiversity and society widely. The European Commission highlights the effects of GI for strategic planning, which brings the rural and urban areas to an entirety by forming the physically or functionally connected networks. Incorporating terrestrial and aquatic (freshwater and marine) features (i.e. blue and green), green infrastructure can be composed of pure nature, or it can be a hybrid approach of artificial and natural parts, combining grey and green infrastructure to achieve a resilient solution. Examples of the former include fish migration channels, high-value farmland, parks, forests, floodplains and water retention areas, while the latter includes greenways, green roofs and vertical planting. Such interventions can be deployed at different scales, such as at a site-scale (e.g. green facades or roofs on a building, green courtyards, sidewalks and streets), citywide (e.g. parks and urban forests) or at a landscape scale (e.g. green hubs and corridors).

Edited and translated by Zhang Yifei