ACHIEVING SUSTAINABLE URBANIZATION OF THE NATIONAL THEATRE IN LONDON THROUGH CHANGE OF USE AND FUNCTIONS OF ARCHITECTURE

The human population is currently on the rise and most Europeans live in urban areas, leading to increased urbanization. The change comes with its challenges, as cities, architecture, and urban spaces need to become more fluid, multi-functional, and innovative. This paper examines whether a change of use of public spaces, and functions of architectural and urban forms, can be used as an element in the implementation of sustainable urbanization. The theoretical framework of this paper focuses on literature findings relating to identified key aspects such as innovative approaches in changes of use — recycling and upcycling, green infrastructure and financial aspects, concepts of “right of the place”, and public participation. These aspects are addressed on both theoretical and practical levels, with the National Theatre in London as a case study. Findings convey that the change of use of spaces can be utilized to achieve sustainable urbanization, together with the management of functions and uses of architectural and urban forms. However, further research is needed with various stakeholders to identify a solid and inherent database, as a foundation on which the most optimal urban spaces would emerge, by identifying new functions and uses of urban space and architecture.

Some aspects of sustainable urban planning using environmental solutions

The ecological aspect of urbanization is reflected in the fact that cities are increasingly concentrating all types of environmental pollution, which become serious problems of the deteriorating of people living conditions. In the Future megalopolises more than 70% of the population will live in the next few decades according to the UN report. It is necessary to make all conditions for the ideas implementation of comfortable and safe cities. Research and innovation of ecological solutions for eco-cities includes four directions. The article discusses one of them, it is the Enhancing the sustainable urbanization, its classification, which include the sustainable Urban Planning with the Sustainable Drainage System (SuDS) approach. The article provides functions and advantages of SuDS systems. Particular attention is paid to the zones of forgotten urban spaces. These zones can improve business and residential areas, as multi-functional design with nature can create new dynamic spaces that increase property values, thereby attracting investors, improving citizens’ well-being. The article provides some examples of draft designs for the improvement of the coastal zones of the Yeltsovka-2 River, located in the area of Zaeltsovsky Park.

Agent-Based Modeling of the Formation and Prevention of Residential Diffusion on Urban Edges

This paper presents an exploratory urban dynamics agent-based model (ABM) that simulates the relationship between the introduction of a hub facility open to residents, the interaction promotion around it, and transport policies on the sustainability of urban development through the autonomous actions of individual residents. By contrasting the model results with theoretical and empirical insights from actual cities, the validity of modeling the formation of residential diffusion on urban edges based on individual gain-maximizing daily travel and residential relocation is explained. The major contribution of the model is that it offers a new perspective on the bottom-up control of residential diffusion on urban edges, with benefits for productive human interactions at the microscale. Specifically, the model experimentally suggests the existence of a trade-off between increasing human interactions, through the introduction of an open hub attracting diverse activities and promotion of interaction around it, as well as the progression of residential diffusion. The model also suggests that the direction of urbanization is the result of collective action, and sustainable urbanization may be achieved through concerted efforts.

Monitoring Metropolitan Growth Dynamics for Achieving Sustainable Urbanization (SDG 11.3) in Kolkata Metropolitan Area, India

The mass accumulation of population in the larger cities of India has led to accelerated and unprecedented peripheral urban expansion over the last few decades. This rapid peripheral growth is characterized by an uncontrolled, low density, fragmented and haphazard patchwork of development popularly known as urban sprawl. The Kolkata Metropolitan Area (KMA) has been one of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in India and is experiencing rampant suburbanization and peripheral expansion. Hence, understanding urban growth and its dynamics in these rapidly changing environments is critical for city planners and resource managers. Furthermore, understanding urban expansion and urban growth patterns are essential for achieving inclusive and sustainable urbanization as defined by the United Nations in the Sustainable Development Goals (e.g., SDGs, 11.3). The present research attempts to quantify and model the urban growth dynamics of large and diverse metropolitan areas with a distinct methodology considering the case of KMA. In the study, land use and land cover (LULC) maps of KMA were prepared for three different years (i.e., for 1996, 2006, and 2016) through the classification of Landsat imagery using a support vector machine (SVM) classification approach. Then, change detection analysis, landscape metrics, a concentric zone approach, and Shannon’s entropy approach were applied for spatiotemporal assessment and quantification of urban growth in KMA. The achieved classification accuracies were found to be 89.75%, 92.00%, and 92.75%, with corresponding Kappa values of 0.879, 0.904, and 0.912 for 1996, 2006, and 2016, respectively. It is concluded that KMA has been experiencing typical urban sprawl. The peri-urban areas (i.e., KMA-rural) are growing rapidly, and are characterized by leapfrogging and fragmented built-up area development, compared to the central KMA (i.e., KMA-urban), which has become more compact in recent years.

Environmental Protection Acts in India

The environment of our planet is degrading at an alarming rate because of non-sustainable urbanization, industrialization and agriculture. There is need of management of natural resources, biodiversity loss, land use, convention on biological diversity and ecosystem diversity. The rapid increase in industrialization and human needs, environment has been badly suffered. That why there was need of creating law for conversion of environment in India. So environmental laws made for huge to maintain an ecological balance of environment by safeguarding the forests and wildlife, biodiversity, forest conservation of the country. The ministry of environment forest & the nodal agency is the administrative structure of the central government for the planning, promotion, co-ordination and overseeing the implementation of environment& forestry programmes. The principle activity taken by ministry of environment& forest and wildlife prevention control of pollution, afforestation regeneration of degraded areas and protection of environment in the framework of legislation. This research paper will be focus on what has action & laws are made by Indian government for protection of environment.

Exploring the multi-dimensional coordination relationship between population urbanization and land urbanization based on the MDCE model: A case study of the Yangtze River Economic Belt, China

The rapid development of urbanization has had a dramatic impact on the economy, society and environment in China. In this context, the coordination relationship between population urbanization and land urbanization is essential for achieving sustainable urbanization. Based on the statistical data from 2007–2017 in the Yangtze River Economic Belt (YEB), this paper established the multi-dimensional coordination evaluation (MDCE) model by using the speed coordination evaluation (SCE) model, the level consistency evaluation (LCE) model, the entropy method and the space matching evaluation (SME) model to evaluate the coordination relationship between population urbanization and land urbanization from the speed-level-space perspective. The results showed that from 2007 to 2017: 1) the development speed of population urbanization and land urbanization in the YEB were more and more coordinated, and the speed of population urbanization lagged behind that of land urbanization. In addition, the overall development speed of the 11 provinces declined, and most of them were characterized by excessive development of land urbanization. 2) the development level of population urbanization and land urbanization in the YEB were all high, but the development level of population urbanization was lower than that of land urbanization. Further, the development level of the 11 provinces remained stable and high, and continuously improved. 3) the space matching of population urbanization and land urbanization in the YEB had a high degree of coordination, and the space matching degree of population urbanization was higher than that of land urbanization. Moreover, the space matching of most provinces in the region had declined, but the change was small. Finally, this paper proposes the policy recommendations on the coordinated development of population and land urbanization at the institutional, market and management levels to achieve coordinated and sustainable urbanization.

Sustainability of Urbanization, Non-Agricultural Output and Air Pollution in the World’s Top 20 Polluting Countries

Rapid urbanization is being increasingly recognized as a significant factor of environmental pollution across the world. However, the significance of sustainable urbanization in controlling both pollution and population remains either limited in scope, in the case of developed countries, or less researched, in the case of developing nations. To fill this gap, the present study employed both theoretical and empirical tools to investigate the significant link between sustainable urbanization, pollution and non-agricultural output. In order to empirically examine the supposed link among the key variables mentioned above, the present study considered a panel of the world’s top 20 polluting countries for the 1991–2018 period, which significantly includes both developed and developing nations. Panel vector error correction model and panel co-integration techniques were employed to derive the possible correlation between the variables through sustainable urbanization. Empirical findings show an absence of equilibrium relations among the three variables in the panel of developed countries. However, the study clearly finds that all the three indicators maintain long-run associations for the panel of developing countries. Furthermore, in the short run, the results determine unambiguously that there are significant causal interplays between any two sets of variables and the remaining one variable for both the panel data of developed and developing countries. On the other hand, short-run interplays among the variables we considered exist for both developed and developing economies. From the perspective of policy formulation, the present study shows that policy makers from both the developed and developing nations should be cautious before encouraging urbanization, at least in the short term. However, the combined effects in the short and long term suggest policy makers should be more careful before encouraging urbanization in developing economies.