Essays Archive

Many voices. Greener cities. Better cities.
September, 2022

3 September 2022

An AI-generated picture of a desert with a bug-looking creatures and a group of people behind them standing far away from spire-like structures
Species on the Move: Assisted Migration in an Era of Rapid Change
Daniel Phillips, Lubbock

In April of 2022, the New York Times ran a viral piece on its front page entitled Trying Everything, Including Lettuce, to Save Florida’s Beloved Manatees. It details a sordid tale of Floridian Manatees — sea cows — struggling for survival amid a riverine habitat polluted by industrial effluents and...

August, 2022

26 August 2022

A picture of a field full of trash and people standing next to it with bags
Challenges of Formal-Informal Collaboration in Lilongwe, Malawi
Andrew Hughes, Sheffield Jose Puppim, São Paulo

Informal organizational structures are commonly involved with greening efforts in cities, such as waste recycling and urban agriculture efforts. They are particularly relevant in cities of the Global South, where large percentages of the economy and labour are in the informal sector. Collaboration between the formal and informal sectors poses...

17 August 2022

Four pictures of people talking to each other underneath trees in different areas
Committing to Diversity in the Research on People’s Perceptions of Urban Nature
Camilo Ordóñez, Melbourne Janina Kowalski, Toronto

Many cities around the world are planning to enhance urban nature. For example, many global cities have promised to plant a million trees, such as Shanghai, New York, Singapore, and Miami, and there are large tree planting initiatives in Uttar Pradesh, Ethiopia, and China, among many others. But most of...

11 August 2022

Discovering Metropolitan Detroit’s Wild Side Through The Great Lakes Way
John Hartig, Windsor

The portion of the Great Lakes basin ecosystem stretching from southern Lake Huron through western Lake Erie is a unique urban refugium where the tapestry of life has been woven with elegance, where the music of life has been rehearsed to perfection for thousands of years, where nature’s colors are...

5 August 2022

Several different colored boxes with ideas surrounding biodiversity protection
What Are the Cities Doing to Protect Pollinators and the Biodiversity?
Ana Pinheira, Guimarães Guilherme Sequeira Braga, Guimarães

  Biodiversity faces increasing challenges with the development of cities. Land-use change, intensive agricultural management and pesticide use, invasive alien species, diseases, climate change, and environmental pollution are threatening bees and other pollinators. Helping them to survive means ensuring food security and maintaining healthy ecosystems. Nature conservation and the improvement...

July, 2022

24 July 2022

A large room with high arched ceilings, skylights, and a skeleton hanging from the ceiling while people stand around below
Charles Darwin and the Guy from Upstairs: A visit to the Natural History Museum
Joseph Rabie, Montreuil

At the end of November 2021, spending a few days in London, I paid a far too brief visit to the Natural History Museum. I had devoted the daylight hours to a survey of the skyscrapers burgeoning in the City’s business district and got to the museum just as the...

10 July 2022

A sparrowhawk sitting on pavement
Then Came the Crash
Andreas Weber, Berlin

I wasn’t in a good shape when I broke the sparrowhawk’s wings. A gray sky over Berlin, a cold eastern wind. An early March day that never had properly lighted up and already started to sink back into dawn. No rain, no snow, but this dry and uncomfortable wind. I...

June, 2022

29 June 2022

Photo Essay: Seoul and the Call of the Urban Wild
Patrick M. Lydon, Daejeon

In the most densely populated city in the developed world, people walk to work through a forest instead of driving in traffic. They take vacations on the metro, family picnics on the edge of a cliff, and routinely walk from their doorstep into a vast urban national park called Bukhansan....

20 June 2022

A picture of an outdoor space full of leaves with a sign reading "Please leave the leaves"
Blowing in the Wind: Leaf Blower Disservices for Human and Ecosystem Health in the City
Lidiya Beida, Toronto Felix Lambert, Inujuak Emma Despland, Montréal Rebecca Tittler, Montréal Carly Ziter, Montreal

Reconsidering leaf blowers Calls for the ban of leaf blowers in urban centers are on the rise, including community group initiatives, municipal bans, opinion pieces, and proposed state/provincial and national-level legislation. The reasons include noise pollution, particulates, and other conventional pollutants, greenhouse gas emissions, and ecological disruption. Understanding the interconnected...

13 June 2022

A group of people walking on a path under trees
Heat Risks are Rising in Cities Worldwide — Here Is How to Plan for Urban Heat Resilience
Sara Meerow, Tempe Ladd Keith, Tucson

Cities everywhere are getting hotter. Globally, every year from 2013 to 2021 ranked among the 10 hottest on record due to climate change. Urban areas are generally warming at a faster rate than rural or natural areas due to the urban heat island (UHI), a phenomenon whereby the built environment...

6 June 2022

A diagram of how nbs effect community interactions
Three Lessons for Co-creating Nature-based Solutions: How Can We Build Natural Networks to Deliver the Deal With Stakeholders?
Shibeal McCann, Dublin Lodder Marleen, Rotterdam Paula Vandergert, London Kato Allaert, Rotterdam

More than half of the world’s population lives and works in diverse, bustling cities. And perhaps, if you are reading this blog, you have a desire to make these places we call home greener—it can be done with nature-based solutions! Quite often city-makers who want to implement nature-based solutions run...

May, 2022

30 May 2022

A picture of a close up of growing sprouts overlooking a building across the street
Can Permaculture Save the World?
Lamiaa Biaz, Paris

Like seeds planted in my brain The first time I ever heard about permaculture was in 2016. I discovered this life philosophy in the French documentaries “The World of Tomorrow” (by Cyril Dion and Mélanie Laurent), and then in “A Quest for Meaning” (by Nathanaël Coste and Marc de la...

23 May 2022

A concept drawing of a park
Threading the Needle: Advancing Equitable Green Infrastructure Investments in US Cities
Will Allen, Chapel Hill

Dr. Ian Mell from the University of Manchester recently published an article in Frontiers in Sustainable Cities on the role of green infrastructure in cities as a tool for economic and ecological “regeneration”. Dr. Mell’s article is one of a series of articles in both the peer-reviewed and popular literature...

18 May 2022

COVID-19 as an Accelerator to Rethink the City
Ana Faggi, Buenos Aires

Urban public space has been a subject of rethinking for decades regarding its role as a catalyst for revitalization and as a promoter of social interaction. Thus, most cities have experienced substantial improvements which positioned them in a better ranking of liveable cities, since the type and quality of urban...

1 May 2022

Urban Form and Urban Nature After the COVID-19 Pandemic
Rob McDonald, Basel

The COVID-19 pandemic is slowly receding and, while it still is a fatally serious problem in some places, it is possible to imagine it at least receding into an endemic disease. It is perhaps, therefore, a good time to reflect on what COVID-19 has meant and will mean for urban...

April, 2022

21 April 2022

A illustration of a park within a city
Translocal Adventures, Communities of Practice, and the TNOC Festival
Duncan Crowley, Lisbon Giorgia Silvestri, Rotterdam Sara Silva, Lisbon

UrbanA, ECOLISE, and Communities for Future joined forces to lead an experimental seed session on the first day of the amazing The Nature of Cities Festival (with online discussions on the #TNOCFestival hashtag). About 25 people turned up from different corners of the planet, on Monday 22nd of February 2021,...

14 April 2022

Better Rankings for Better Cities: The Limitations and Prospects of City Rankings
Devansh Jain, Singapore Perrine Hamel, Singapore

So, what happens when a city reaches the top ranks? Have you ever noticed the kind of media attention the city gets? City rankings are indeed very popular and attract a lot of media attention across the globe. Each year, there are more than 40 city indices published globally. In...

4 April 2022

A flooded street with cars and people
Developing a Successful Climate Action Plan for Mumbai
Samarth Das, Mumbai

Acknowledging local conditions and ensuring adherence across agencies and citizens will ensure achievements of its goals. With over 140 km of coastline and 480 sq.km land area, Mumbai is one of the most vulnerable cities to climate change induced hazards such as sea-level rise, storm surge, and urban flooding amongst...

March, 2022

21 March 2022

A gathering of people at an outdoor table under an awning
Growing Food Together Is Healthy
Marthe Derkzen, Arnhem/Nijmegen Berber Bergstra, Wageningen

Nature and greenery are good for you; we all know that by now. But is it also possible to improve your health by actively seeking out greenery or by getting involved in greenery yourself? That is, can you improve your health simply by taking an action? This is something Wageningen...

2 March 2022

A group of people posing for a photo in front of a statue
Moving toward Anti-Racism in the Environmental Field
Cindy Thomashow, Seattle

This article is a statement of gratitude for experiences that have moved me toward antiracist environmental education. The last 20 years of my life have been a story of reckoning and awakening to pervasive racism and its effect on the environmental field. I was never taught the history of enslavement,...

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