Public open spaces as game-changer in the Post-covid city

Abstract

The paper will examine how public open spaces can be game changer in the multiple ongoing transitions.

Increasingly, people demand an approach that restores balance to urban ecosystems and reconstructs the natural environment. However, the issue is more complex than it initially appears due to uncertainty, to unexpected events such as the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2019, or intense stormwater in urban area.

Furthermore, managing urban ecosystems has become more challenging and more inspiring. Therefore, planners must fully understand the complexity of nature mechanisms to achieve an holistic approach in urbanism. Low Impact Development (LID) is an ecologically-based stormwater approach favoring soft engineering that remediates polluted runoff through a network of distributed treatment landscapes. This approach act as game-changer in public open space design for the post-covid city. LID concepts are scalable to various sized projects and land-use types. The goal is not just to minimize impact, but to develop  regenerative and productive urban landscapes that continually renew ecosystem functioning.

The paper explore the construction of "game-changing" at different scales and through diverse disciplines and examine how bottom-up initiatives, out-of-the-box policies find anchorage in public space transformations.