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MORPHOLOGY & BIODIVERSITY IN THE URBAN GREEN SPACES OF THE CITY OF PORTO - HABITAT MAPPING AND CHARACTERIZATION

07 Feb 2015 - Paulo Farinha Marques, Cláudia Fernandes and Filipa Guilherme (CIBIO-InBIO/UP) | February 13, 2015 - 14h30 | CIBIO-InBIO’s Auditorium, Campus de Vairão
MORPHOLOGY & BIODIVERSITY IN THE URBAN GREEN SPACES OF THE CITY OF PORTO - HABITAT MAPPING AND CHARACTERIZATION

 

Urban parks, gardens and green squares are fundamental spaces for the conservation and promotion of biodiversity in urban settings, as well as the development of healthier and integrative cities. Their multipurpose design based on a matrix of diverse habitats socially accessible and aesthetically pleasing facilitates the interaction of humans, plants and animals, in a network of public spaces, with minimum conflict and general environmental benefits for city life.
These green spaces can vary in terms of biological content, size, shape, perviousness, connectivity, proximity to existing natural environments, etc. It is important to know more about these factors, their relation to biodiversity and how such information can be used to design more biodiverse green spaces in the urban matrix. Relationships between biodiversity indicators and spatial attributes must be examined, in order to identify which compositions and combinations have more positive impact on plants and animals.
With the development of an urban habitat mapping methodology, the research team intends to lay a common base for urban ecology studies through the use of land cover and plant life form concepts. This research aims to contribute to a better understanding and promotion of the relationship between biodiversity, spatial form and management within the urban environment. This contribution to a deeper understanding of urban ecosystems is particularly important for planning, design, management and decision-making on the urban landscape.

 

Paulo Farinha-Marques is an Associate Professor of Landscape Architecture in the Faculty of Science of the University of Porto – Portugal. He graduated in Landscape Architecture in the Technical University of Lisbon – High Institute of Agronomy (1988) and obtained a PhD in the Faculty of Architectural Studies at the University of Sheffield – UK (1999). Since 1996 he has combined teaching and design practice across scales. His main areas of interest are the planning and design of private and public green structures ecologically, socially and aesthetically integrated (gardens, parks, woodlands) vegetation studies in the landscape, biodiversity studies in the urban context, and landscape character assessment.

 

Cláudia Fernandes is a guest Assistant Professor at the University of Porto. With a prior training in Agricultural Engineering and Natural Resources Management she is now entirely dedicated to teaching and research in the field of landscape architecture. Her main interests include: biodiversity patterns in urban environments; modelling vegetation responses under disturbance scenarios; planning urban green structures; design, planting and management of public green spaces and cultural landscapes.

 

Filipa Guilherme is a Biologist, holding a MSc Degree in Conservation Biology and a degree in Environmental Biology by the University of Lisbon, Portugal. She is now working as a researcher on the project “Porto – Public Green Space Morphology and Biodiversity”, in the LPDM Group.

 

 

[Group Leader: Paulo Farinha-Marques, Landscape Planning, Design and Management]

 

Image credits: LPDM 2015

 

Click here to watch the video of this seminar.
Available from April 6 to May 4, 2015

 

 

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