An Ecosystem Services Approach to Green Infrastructure Partnership Planning

人们普遍认识到，生态系统提供了许多有益于人类的服务，但在有关土地和资源利用的决策中，这些服务往往被忽视。在城镇中尤其如此，因为人们常常认为城市地区没有自然。然而，由于近80%的英国人口居住在城市地区，生态系统服务的改善对生活质量有很大的影响。因此，Defra资助的城市水环境生态系统服务（ESUWE）项目已经开始应用生态系统服务方法来证明改善城市水环境可以带来的好处。人们还认识到，协作决策方法有助于可持续流域管理所需的综合规划。因此，ESUWE的工作还旨在提供与利益攸关方沟通和参与的工具，以促进对集水区管理采取参与式方法。ESUWE项目已经确定了城市环境中提供的许多生态系统服务，并制定了量化与这些服务相关的成本和收益的指标。它目前正在四个不同规模的示范区开展工作，绘制和评估生态系统服务，并在当地流域规划中试点使用。人们希望，通过传播有关环境改善的好处的信息，可以更好地了解决策，通过绘制生态系统服务地图，可以确定干预将产生多重好处的领域并确定其优先次序。在整个ESUWE项目中，绿色基础设施（GI）一直被强调为城市社会带来好处，同时提供环境和水文改善。因此，已经确定了将工作范围扩大到直接涉及集水区规划的范围之外的潜力。“创新计划”将使在“可持续生态环境工程”项目下进行的研究得以应用，以满足更广泛的最终用户的需要，例如要调查的本地自然伙伴、当地规划当局和建筑公司，从而增加工作的影响。创新项目将促进与地方和国家层面负责土地利用决策的人员共同开发生态系统服务制图方法，以规划地理标志。这将确保最终用户的需求被纳入决策支持工具的开发中，这些工具将促进地理标志规划，并帮助创建能够表达地理标志在不同部门使用的好处的标准化指标。四个示范领域的工作将探索生态系统服务方法的实际应用，展示地理标志提供的好处，并确定增加这些好处的机会。这将增进战略理解，以便探索潜在的土地使用决定对城市地区提供的服务水平的影响。这将有助于提供一个证据基础，为权衡决策提供信息，并促进提供更多和多重效益的干预措施。创新项目还将产生量化地理标志价值的个案研究，可用于促进在地方和国家一级的土地使用决策中更多地考虑地理标志提供的必要性。伙伴关系方法还将确定地图绘制如何有助于地方综合决策，以支持其他基于地方的倡议。最后，通过考虑如何以提供多种好处的方式实现GI，将确定和推广最佳实践。

It is widely recognised that ecosystems provide numerous services that are of benefit to humans but, in decisions regarding land and resource use, these tend to be overlooked. Within towns and cities this is particularly the case as nature is often considered to be absent in urban areas. However, as nearly 80% of the UK population live in urban areas there is considerable potential for improvements in ecosystem services to have a large impact on quality of life. As a result the Defra funded Ecosystem Services in the Urban Water Environment (ESUWE) project has begun to apply an ecosystem services approach to demonstrate the benefits that improvements in the urban water environment can have. It has also been recognised that a collaborative approach to decision making assists with the integrated planning that is required for sustainable catchment management. Therefore, the work of ESUWE also aims to provide tools to communicate and engage stakeholders in order to facilitate a participatory approach to catchment management. The ESUWE project has identified numerous ecosystem services provided in urban environments and developed metrics to quantify the costs and benefits associated with these. It is now working in four demonstration areas of varying sizes to map and evaluate ecosystem services and to pilot use in local catchment planning. It is hoped that by communicating information about benefits of environmental improvements, decisions can be better informed and that by mapping ecosystem services, areas where interventions will result in multiple-benefits can be identified and prioritised. Throughout the ESUWE project, Green Infrastructure (GI) has been highlighted as being important for delivering benefits to urban societies along with providing environmental and hydrological improvements. Therefore, the potential to expand the scope of the work beyond those directly involved with catchment planning has been identified. The Innovation Project will enable the application of the research conducted under the ESUWE project to meet the needs of a wider range of end users such as local nature partnership, local planning authorities and construction companies to be investigated so that the impact of the work can be increased. The Innovation Project will facilitate co-development of an ecosystem services mapping approach to the planning of GI with those responsible for land use decisions at local and national levels. This will ensure that the needs of end users are incorporated into the development of decision support tools that facilitate GI planning and help create standardised metrics that can express the benefits of GI for use in differing sectors. Work in four demonstration areas will explore the practical application of the ecosystem services approach, demonstrating the benefits provided by GI and identifying opportunities for these to be increased. This will improve strategic understanding so that the effects of potential land use decisions on levels of services provided in urban area can be explored. This will help to provide an evidence base that can inform decisions regarding trade-offs and promote interventions that provide increased and multiple benefits. The Innovation Project will also result in case studies quantifying the value of GI which can be used to promote the need for increased considerations of its provision in land use decision at both local and national levels. A partnership approach will also identify how mapping can aid integrated local decision making to support other place based initiatives. Finally, by considering how GI can be implemented in a way that delivers multiple benefits, best practice will be identified and promoted.