Bring Nature Back to the City; Keep Invasive Species Out

El-kholei, Ahmed O.; Abido, Mohammad S.

doi:10.21608/jur.2022.125873.1090

Bring Nature Back to the City; Keep Invasive Species Out

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

¹ Department of Architectural Engineering Faculty of Engineering, Menofia University, Egypt

² Department of Natural resources and Environment, College of Graduate Studies, Arabian Gulf University, Manama, Bahrain

10.21608/jur.2022.125873.1090

Abstract

Cities are the drivers of economic growth but pollute the environment and deplete natural resources. Nature-based Solutions (NbS) and Ecosystem-based Adaptation (EbA) offer many answers to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Without understanding the threats associated with these solutions, bringing nature back to the city might cause undesired side effects such as introducing and proliferating invasive species. Contemporary literature on invasive species evolves from the urban ecology discipline. The paper explores contemporary literature to highlight the gap between ecologists and design professionals. We found that research published between 2017-2021 and indexed on Scopus that dealt with urban issues and invasive species yielded 4,556 publications, of which only 88 publications that design professionals prepared to indicate a gap between urban ecologists and design professionals explaining the persistence of the problem and concerns that ecologists raise. We conducted a bibliometric analysis. Results indicate three clusters: (1) Pressures such as climate change; (2) State urban ecosystems; and (3) Responses in the form of land use plans and urban designs. NbS and EbA are instrumental in responding to climate change. Planners must design and build cities to minimize the adverse effects of urbanization while maximizing the ecological processes by allowing nature conservation actions within urban environments. One of the criteria for evaluating design and planning alternatives is to check for the risk of introducing invasive species. Design experts must be aware of the risks of invasive species, which require research to update present guidelines and introduce the topic in the architectural and planning curricula.

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