Welcome to the ECOCITY 2022 Interactive Programme

Abstract Body

Environmental action plans are intended to provide the main guidance for environmental protection, playing a vital role in reconciling environmental quality with social and economic development. The success of their implementation relies on the collaboration between the involved actors. Therefore, our study aims to identify the types of stakeholders responsible for the implementation of actions proposed to manage the environmental problems, the core focus of the Local Environmental Action Plans (LEAPs), and the extent of their collaboration. A sample of 40 LEAPs from Romania was selected to identify the stakeholders responsible for the management, funding, implementation and monitoring of LEAPs actions. The stakeholders were classified into two categories as follow: (1) public officials (e.g., European, national, regional, county and local structures) and (2) the general public (e.g., academia, experts, mass-media, private companies, non-governmental organizations and citizens). A network analysis approach was employed in order to identify the most involved and influential stakeholders from each category as well as the relationship between them (e.g., vertical and horizontal coordination). Our preliminary results shows that stakeholders such as municipal administrations at county and local levels are the most involved in the local environmental planning process. Furthermore, the involvement of the general public involvement (especially of the citizens and non-governmental organizations) was low. In conclusion, our study tries to better understand the collaboration and coordination of different sectors in order to offer recommendations for an efficient implementation of environmental planning.

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To tackle the Coronavirus pandemic, countries across the world have implemented a range of stringent policies, including stay-at-home ‘lockdowns‘; school and workplace closures; cancellation of events and public gatherings; and restrictions on public transport. These measures were implemented to slow the spread of the virus by enforcing physical distance between people but they have also most likely changed people use of the urban environments. Google COVID-19 Community Mobility Reports which provide a regularly updated dataset that shows how peoples’ movements have changed throughout the pandemic, offers a great opportunity to investigate how the people mobility and frequentation of urban environments have changed. The reports in fact provide measures of visitor numbers to specific categories of location (e.g. grocery stores; parks; train stations) every day, comparing this change relative to baseline day before the pandemic outbreak. Baseline days represent a normal value for that day of the week, given as median value over the five‑week period from January 3rd to February 6th 2020. Aim of this study is to analyse how the pandemic and the containment measures changed the use of urban locations in Italy with a special attention to urban green spaces. Urban green space is a fundamental element in the urban environment, providing multiple ecosystem services and particularly beneficial effects on physical and mental health. In times of societal crisis like the COVID-19 pandemic, these effects may even be amplified. Some studies have already shown how "spending time outdoors" was particularly missed during the COVID-19 isolation, and how urban green spaces were important for providing places of solace and relaxation. Our study results show how the mobility to parks and green spaces have significantly increased during lockdown and how the mobility was strongly influenced by the different types of containment measures and restrictions.

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BUILDING DESIGN IN THE POST-COVID ERA

The COVID-19 pandemic has taught us that buildings might be safe havens when looking e.g. at weather impacts on people. As far as virus exposure is concerned, the opposite might be true. Research has shown that outside the risk of cross-infection with corona virusses is much lower than indoors. Does this mean that we should move all our activities (think also of future pandemics) to the outside? This of course is not feasable in practice. Than another question arises: how should we design, operate and maintain our buildings and building services systems in the future in order to make them more 'virus proof'? A general analysis was conducted to make an inventory of preventive measures that can be taken to make new and existing schools, office, event locations, nursing homes etc more safe. The analysis that underlies this position paper consisted of a literature survey and of workshops with specialists. The main focus was not on measures related to e.g. handhygiene and mask wearing, in stead the focus was on building and building operation related measures. One specific area of interest here were preventive measures related to aersol transmission (the aerogenic route). Think e.g. of the application of (extra) ventilation (mechanical and natural) and the use of (central or stand-alone) air cleaning devices. Also other measures related to the operation and design of building services systems (esp. HVAC systems) were evaluated. The concrete outcome of the project is an evidence-based overview of generic measures that help to make buildings more virus (virus cross transmission) resisted.

Abstract Body

Abstract

On 18 March 2020, the World Health Organization announced that COVID-19 became a global pandemic. The Ministry of Health implemented a COVID-19 lockdown that extended for four months. After the period of restrictions ended, people were supposed to return to their normal social life; however, the lockdown has caused a psychological impact on people without them being aware of it. This research aimed to study the effect of COVID-19 on social life in Riyadh, mainly focusing on three public activities: visiting shopping malls, mosques, and open spaces. The data were collected by using Google forms. In addition, a simulation computer program was used to study and develop the outdoor environment. The research focused on the outdoor environment, to find solutions. The results demonstrated that people are slowly returning to their social life during the COVID-19 pandemic but are steadily visiting shopping malls, mosques, and open spaces. The recommendation is applying the health procedures during this time at the three places, shaping the designs of places, and managing the psychological effects.

Keywords: COVID-19; Sustainability; social life, shopping malls, mosques, outdoor environment; design the interior spaces; psychological impact.