Comhar Sustainable Development Council have appointed Compass to undertake a baseline study of Green Infrastructure for Ireland. The study involves a review of current policies and legislation and the preparation of framework national GI maps and illustrative case studies in urban, rural and peri-urban areas.
The promotion and development of the ‘green infrastructure’ concept, which can be defined as ‘an interconnected network of green space that conserves natural ecosystem values and functions and provides associated benefits to human populations’, can assist in overcoming many of the issues associated with habitat degradation and biodiversity loss in Ireland. The consideration and appreciation of the importance of spatial planning as a mechanism to ensure greater activity within the green infrastructure sector can make a significant contribution to the evidence base for policy and decision making in this area.
There is a need to proactively develop Green Infrastructures, and in particular ecological connectivity, which will both enhance biodiversity and human wellbeing, and improve resilience and adaptation to climate change. To ensure development and promotion of the Green Infrastructure concept, stakeholder consultation and involvement is essential.
There are significant opportunities for the development and advancement of Green Infrastructure in Ireland particularly through the ‘ecological network’ approach and the considerations of multi-functionality and connectivity. The preliminary national map as undertaken by the project seeks to commence the process of designing a national Green Infrastructure framework map. It also seeks to provide a framework for the project’s illustrative case studies and to provide a national overview of Green Infrastructure. These maps are relatively easy to prepare from a selection of national datasets, which can be supplemented readily by datasets representing additional features. Such a national framework map could be easily revised in the future as data improves and as the map undergoes review by potential users.
The project undertook to provide illustrations of how Green Infrastructure might be identified and mapped via three case studies for sample areas covering different general landscape and context types. The case studies included an urban area, a peri-urban area and a more regional rural area. The case studies recognised that formal Green Infrastructure and other planning approaches are underway in these areas, and that the project work is illustrative only. The pilot studies raise some interesting issues still to be discusses and resolved including: the integration of Green Infrastructure planning with traditional planning, the need for national objectives, the introduction of strategic land use planning in areas which have not been subject detailed spatial planning, the recognition of ecosystem services in local plans and the collection of appropriate information on local features of Green Infrastructure.
A SWOT analysis of Green Infrastructure has been carried out identifying and summarising the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of the approach. This analysis serves to highlight what needs to be done to make the green infrastructure approach one that is central to spatial planning, including the obstacles to achieving that. This is followed by a recommend planning process which sets out the various stages involved in the preparation of a Green Infrastructure plan following best practice models. This planning process should follow a typical rational planning methodology including: (a) a process planning stage, (b) analysis, (c) plan and strategy formulation, and (d) implementation, with feedback between the stages. As with any development planning exercise, it should incorporate stakeholder participation throughout the process.
It is believed that Green Infrastructure and Spatial Planning Policy are more compatible with current plan making processes which are focussed on urban areas, and with some modifications current plan making can accommodate the Green Infrastructure concept in these locations. In summary any Green Infrastructure approach needs to be conceived, planned and designed. The application of any such approach should be fully integrated with spatial planning.
For more information please view the presentations as made at the Comhar 2009 Annual Joint Biodiversity Conference.