Sus­tainable ur­ban-rural eco­sys­tems

Future Cities Laboratory (FCL) Global’s aims of developing sustainable solutions for urbanisation, resource management, and food production imply an interdisciplinary approach that considers the interactions between the dimensions of sustainability on the one hand and the interdependencies between city, countryside, and nature on the other.

Healthier and more resilient

Grounded in urban ecology and urban system science disciplines, the module Comparative Ecology of Cities (CEC) explores pattern-process-function relationships across five critical urban functions. 

Biodiversity: with the purpose of examining the relationship between the pattern of urban elements and biodiversity and of demonstrating that a good integration of built elements and landscape can enhance species richness, thus claiming that biodiversity conservation and urban growth can – and should – coexist.

Climate and energy: addressing the large energy consumption and emission amounts for which cities are responsible and aiming to show that tailored urban greening strategies can enhance climate resilience and energy sustainability, ultimately reducing the urban heat island effect.

Socio-economics: focusing on the analysis of the relationship between urban pattern and local economic vibrancy, with the goal of contributing to the design of environmentally sustainable and economically resilient urban areas.

Health: underscoring the importance of tree canopy configuration, beyond simply increasing canopy cover, to optimise the health benefits of urban greening initiatives towards healthier and more resilient habitats. 

Hydrology: addressing the impacts of climate change and urban expansion that lead to increased pluvial flooding risk in cities and providing actionable insights for urban planners and policymakers, which emphasise the importance of adopting urban design principles that contribute to enhancing flood resilience.

Scaling and multi-stress perspective

Flood resilience is also a main topic of the module Sea-City Interface (SEA). The low-elevation coastal zone covers only 2% of the Earth’s surface, but 13% of the global population live there, 350 to 400 million people in about 40 megacities. These coastal megacities are under a multitude of stresses. 

Nature-based solutions (NBS) or blue-green infrastructure (BGI) are an accepted measure to reduce urban stress, but two questions remain: are these approaches scalable? And how do we view them in a multi-stress perspective? SEA provides a holistic view of how coastal urban environments are exposed to and may adapt to the increasingly intense climate changes, such as heat, winds, floods, and sea level rise.

Since coastal cities are generally low-gradient areas, heavy rainfall can generate high surface run-off and flooding. SEA quantifies causal relations, combining satellite rainfall data with high-resolution urban topography and two-dimensional urban run-off modelling, to predict inundated areas and estimate risk. 

Green spaces are beneficial both in terms of rainwater regulation and temperature reduction. By analysing heat exposure, the research aims to understand how urban design strategies can mitigate increasing heat stress. As outdoor thermal comfort is also a function of airflow speed, the research team uses design studios to explore how the built environment can reduce wind speeds. 

The ultimate goal is to provide decision-makers in coastal cities with a framework that will enable them to prioritise the future hazards to which they are most exposed and which have the greatest potential impact on them and thereby reduce vulnerability.

Sustainable food production

The research of the module Agropolitan Territories of Monsoon Asia (AGR) is situated at the intersection of urbanisation and agriculture. Industrial agriculture accounts for roughly 80% of global deforestation and about 70% of global freshwater withdrawals; more than 33% of the world’s soils are considered degraded due to intensive agriculture, deforestation, and overgrazing. 

Industrial agriculture germinates from and serves the global, linear food system. It has led us to a dire current state, where uneven distribution of benefits and environmental impacts are exacerbating social and economic inequalities, and perpetuates the very problem of food insecurity that it sought to solve. 

In contrast, agroecology integrates ecological principles into farming and combines traditional knowledge and scientific technological advancement to achieve sustainable and resilient food systems. Switching gears from industrial agriculture to agroecology, however, requires coordinated efforts on other levels of the system, including economics, spatial planning, and urbanisation. 

The research aims to rethink and reconfigure the relationship between agriculture and urbanisation. What is the future of the manifold agricultural territories that support cities? How do we plan agropolitan regions that support healthy ecologies, robust economies, and resilient communities via sensitive policymaking, infrastructural planning, and settlement design?

Designing a sustainable agri-urbanism

The “urban” and the “rural” have long been conceived as separate fields of expertise, organised through distinct disciplinary approaches. However, urbanisation has affected ever vaster areas across the globe, highlighting the necessity for a paradigm shift and a critical reflection as proposed by the concept of planetary urbanisation: while concentrated urbanisation generates large agglomerations which often affect distant hinterlands, extended urbanisation spreads the urban fabric to ever more remote places, affecting an increasing proportion of agricultural territories. These territories are today at the core of the climate crisis, the biodiversity crisis, and the foreseen significant decline in agricultural yields. 

Read more:
CEC Comparative Ecology of Cities
Prof. Dr. Paolo Burlando
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Tan Puay Yok

SEA
The Sea-City Interface
Prof. Dr. Peter Molnar 
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Rudi Stouffs

AGR
Agropolitan Territories of Monsoon Asia
Prof. Dr. Stephen Cairns

NEW
New Urban Agendas under Planetary Urbanisation
Asst. Prof. Dr. Naomi Hanakata
Prof. Dr. Christian Schmid
Prof. Dr. Milica Topalović

The module New Urban Agendas under Planetary Urbanisation (NEW) investigates the future of extended urbanisation in agricultural territories, addressing the research gap for agroecological design. The first aim is to better understand the urban transformations affecting agricultural regions. The second aim is to develop exemplary large-scale design proposals and new governance strategies for an agri-urbanism, based on the principles of agroecology and sustainable urban development. 

This territorial design process serves as a platform for synthesis and knowledge integration, developing practical solutions across interconnected disciplinary fields. The research compiles a comparative overview of five case studies across Europe and Asia and proposes new landscape typologies. The interdisciplinary design cluster Agroecological Design for the Zurich Region is producing a cartographic synthesis of the agri-territory Zurich and is providing novel design and governance proposals.