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Copyright of Artl@s Bulletin is the property of Purdue University Press and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The pursuit of happiness as an issue in planning for towns in trans-Appalachian America was a prime requisite. It is the intent of this paper to illustrate that, while many of the towns were paper towns that were never actualised, they acted as a catalyst for immigrants seeking to escape the oppression of Europe. Visualised as a new Eden, and promising land ownership with liberty, they were an opiate so strong that even with numerous instances of fraud and deceit the settlers came. Their belief that they had indeed arrived at Eden was so strong that it transcended any and all difficulties. This belief has influenced the planning and development of towns in America up to and including modern times. As long as people believe that their living situation is what is meant for them, their pursuit of happiness is satisfied. They have found their Eden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Incunabula are printed materials created in Europe from the time of Johann Gutenberg's invention until 1500. Incunabula originate from the Latin language (lat. Incunabulum) and mean cradle or the beginning of something. In this paper, the representation of individual states and cities in the creation of incunabula is investigated and presented. The persons responsible for such development are also listed. Special attention is given to the presentation of Croatian incunabula. The mentioned works describe the characteristic features. Incunabula testify to a high level of culture, standards, and technological development of a particular area. The studied works reveal and confirm, as confirmed in this paper, the attitude of society towards literacy, education, and the national culture of each nation. This paper aims to comprehensively present the importance of incunabula for the development of European and Croatian culture, technological and comprehensive progress. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There has been an increasing level of recognition of the interaction between cultural mega-events and built heritage in recent years. While research has broadly identified the need to align strategies and visions, as well as involve heritage actors and local communities, there has not been a systematic investigation of the position of industrial heritage within this tableau. This paper examines in depth the European Capital of Culture (ECoC) programme, as it is one of the longest standing Capital of Culture programmes in the world and has a significant record of investment and urban transformation. In this paper, we survey and categorise the inclusion of industrial heritage within the ECoC programme in 36 host cities and regions spread across Europe. This research provides the most comprehensive understanding to date of the specific forms of interaction between industrial heritage and ECoCs to better understand the kinds of relationships that have taken place. We then explore in detail the projects and decisions made in the cases of the 2023 Elefsina, 2017 Pafos and 2008 Liverpool ECoCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main aim of this paper is to present an innovative approach to addressing the challenges of smart mobility exploiting digital twins within the METACITIES initiative. We have worked on this issue due to the increasing complexity of urban transportation systems, coupled with the urgent need to improve efficiency, safety, and sustainability in cities. The work presented in this paper is part of the project METACITIES, an Excellence Hub that spans a large geographical area, that of Southeastern Europe. The approach of the Greek innovation ecosystem of METACITIES involves leveraging digital twin technology to create intelligent replicas of urban mobility environments, enabling real-time monitoring, analysis, and decision making. Through use cases such as "Smart Parking", "Environmental Behavior Analysis on Traffic Incidents", and "Emergency Management", we demonstrate how digital twins can optimize traffic flow, mitigate environmental impact, and enhance emergency response; these use cases will be tested on a small scale, before deciding on implementation at a larger and more expensive scale. The final outcome is the METACITIES Architecture for smart mobility, which will be part of an Open Digital Twin Framework capable of evolving a smart city into a metacity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the Positive Energy District Database (PED DB), a pivotal web tool developed collaboratively by the COST Action 'PED-EU-NET', in alignment with international initiatives such as JPI Urban Europe and IEA EBC Annex 83. The PED DB represents a crucial step towards sharing knowledge, promoting collaboration, reinforcing decision-making, and advancing the understanding of Positive Energy Districts (PEDs) in the pursuit of sustainable urban environments. The PED DB aims to comprehensively map and disseminate information on PEDs across Europe, serving as a dynamic resource for sustainable urban development according to the objective of making the EU climate-neutral by 2050. Indeed, PEDs imply an integrated approach for designing urban areas—the districts—where a cluster of interconnected buildings and energy communities produce net zero greenhouse gas emissions, managing an annual local/regional overflow production of renewable energy. The paper describes the collaborative step-by-step process leading to the PED DB implementation, the current results and potentials of the online platform, and introduces its future developments towards a more user-friendly and stakeholders-tailored tool. The interactive web map offers a customizable visualizations and filters on multiple information related to PED case studies, PED-relevant cases, and PED Labs. Users can access detailed information through a table view, facilitating comparisons across different PED projects and their implementation phase. The paper offers insights and detailed analysis from the initial dataset that includes 23 PED cases and 7 PED-related projects from 13 European countries, highlighting the key characteristics of surveyed PEDs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper assesses the contribution of built cultural heritage to the quality of life in peripheralised small and medium-sized towns (SMTs). While the scientific discourse on peripheralised towns and regions is largely focused on development threats and challenges, this paper highlights heritage as an endogenous resource with the potential to promote a high quality of life in peripheralised towns. A case study covering ten historic towns at the German–Polish border constitutes the basis of the research presented in this paper. Qualitative focus group workshops have been conducted in each town to get detailed insights into the heritage-related quality of life. It appears that under specific conditions, heritage contributes to the quality of life in peripheralised SMTs. This contribution is more pronounced on emotional terms, i.e. regarding meaningful constitutions of place and social cohesion. Practical domains of quality of life related to urban functions or the economy benefit less from the towns' heritage. It follows that the heritage ressources themselves are no warranty for an enhancement of the quality of life in peripheralised SMTs. Exploiting their potential remains context dependent, and peripheralised SMTs are faced with particular socio-spatial challenges in this regard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Starting from the relationship between urban planning and mobility management, TeMA has gradually expanded the view of the covered topics, always remaining in the groove of rigorous scientific in-depth analysis. This section of the Journal, Review Notes, is the expression of continuously updating emerging topics concerning relationships between urban planning, mobility and environment, through a collection of short scientific papers written by young researchers. The Review Notes are made of four parts. Each section examines a specific aspect of the broader information storage within the main interests of TeMA Journal. In particular, the Urban Practices section aims at presenting recent advancements on relevant topics that underline the challenges that the cities have to face. This note provides an overview of the challenges that global warming poses and the risks in terms of climate change that it generates for territories and cities. The challenges that adaptation to climate change commonly faces are outlined, and a brief review of European case studies is carried out. Finally, the results of the review are discussed highlighting some key threads of climate adaptation practices and three significant examples of climate change adaptation in urban areas are reported, within a perspective of integration and sharing of know-how on the topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an overview of the modelling of particle number concentrations (PNC's) in five major European cities, namely Helsinki, Oslo, London, Rotterdam and Athens, in 2008. Novel emission inventories of particle numbers have been compiled both on urban and European scales. We use atmospheric dispersion modelling for PNC's in the five target cities and on a European scale, and evaluate the predicted results against available measured concentrations. The concentrations of PN in the selected cities were mostly influenced by the emissions originated from local vehicular traffic; however, in some of the cities, also harbour and airport activities were significant. The highest values of the predicted PNC's were higher in the megacities, London and Athens, and also in Rotterdam, whereas these were lower in Helsinki and Oslo. It was numerically evaluated that the influence of coagulation and dry deposition on the predicted PNC's was substantial for urban background in Oslo. The predicted and measured annual average PNC's in four cities agreed within approximately ⩽36% (measured as fractional biases), except for one traffic station in London. The indexes of agreement (IA) for the comparisons of hourly measured and predicted time-series in Oslo and Helsinki ranged from 0.75 to 0.79. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nature-Based Solutions concepts and practices are being used worldwide as part of attempts to address societal challenges but have also been criticised for not dealing with deeper transformations needed to face urgent issues including biodiversity loss, climate change and inclusion. In this paper, we explore how an inclusive, integrated and long-sighted approach, emphasising a more radical integration of nature within cities, might support the transformations needed to endure major contemporary challenges. Addressing important emerging critiques of Nature-Based Solutions, we consider the potential of a more incisive form of Nature-Based Thinking (NBT) in cities, based on more holistic perspectives. The paper draws on a reflective and iterative research process that engaged both the research and practice communities through a symposium and a series of futures workshops that together explored the potential of NBT to develop future nature-cities relations in Europe and Latin America. The results of the reflective process suggest that notions of nature with people—not for people— new organisational structures, and the intention and capacity to apply long-term perspectives, are needed when planning for NBS interventions aimed at sustainable urban development. This includes developing a cultural-structural change based on new and inclusive understandings of human–nature relations, and novel governance paradigms that allow cross-sectoral coordination and engagement of local stakeholders beyond formal organisational structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nowadays, Land Degradation Neutrality (LDN) is on the political agenda as one of the main objectives in order to respond to the increasing degradation processes affecting soils and territories. Nevertheless, proper implementation of environmental policies is very difficult due to a lack of the operational, reliable and easily usable tools necessary to support political decisions when identifying problems, defining the causes of degradation and helping to find possible solutions. It is within this framework that this paper attempts to demonstrate a new valuable web-based operational LDN tool as a component of an already running Spatial Decision Support System (S-DSS) developed on a Geospatial Cyberinfrastructure (GCI). The tool could be offered to EU administrative units (e.g., municipalities) so that they may better evaluate the state and the impact of land degradation in their territories. The S-DSS supports the acquisition, management and processing of both static and dynamic data, together with data visualization and on-the-fly computing, in order to perform modelling, all of which is potentially accessible via the Web. The land degradation data utilized to develop the LDN tool refer to the SDG 15.3.1 indicator and were obtained from a platform named Trends.Earth, designed to monitor land change by using earth observations, and post-processed to correct some of the major artefacts relating to urban areas. The tool is designed to support land planning and management by producing data, statistics, reports and maps for any EU area of interest. The tool will be demonstrated through a short selection of practical case studies, where data, tables and stats are provided to challenge land degradation at different spatial extents. Currently, there are WEBGIS systems to visualize land degradation maps but—to our knowledge—this is the first S-DSS tool enabling customized LDN reporting at any NUTS (nomenclature of territorial units for statistics) level for the entire EU territory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the recent era of smart city ecosystems and the Internet of Things (IoT), innovative, intelligent parking systems must make cities more sustainable. Every year, the increasing number of city vehicles requires more time to search for parking slots. In large cities, 10% of the traffic congestion occurs because of cruising; drivers spend almost 20 minutes searching for free space to park their vehicles. The passing time of waiting for parking in the traffic leads the issues such as energy, pollution, and stress. There needs to be more than the developed solutions. Therefore, the necessary to create a parking slot availability detection system that informs the drivers in advance about the free parking slot based on location. This paper introduces an enhanced ensemble Deep Learning (DL) model designed to forecast parking slot availability through the integration of IoT, cloud technology, and sensor networks. The devised model, known as Ensemble CNN-Boosted Graph LSTM (ECNN-BGLSTM), is optimized using a Genetic Algorithm (GA) framework. The model's performance is rigorously evaluated using a dataset from Europe, and various metrics, including Root Mean Square Error (RMSE), Mean Square Error (MSE), and Mean Absolute Error (MAE), are employed for assessment. The experimental findings demonstrate the superior performance of the proposed model compared to existing state-of-the-art approaches. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper presents the emerging topics of the international debate for safe mobility in urban areas with an innovative interpretation. This is the bibliometric mapping of the most recurrent concepts (keywords) of almost 80 scientific publications. The paper framework moves from the issue of the sustainability of cities and through a mobility lens. In Europe by 2030 cities have to become climateneutral and some main urban strategy to achieve this result is focused on transport and mobility sectors. The interpretation of the bibliometric mapping results leads to highlighting the shortcomings of some topics within the scientific debate. The Qualiquantitaive Data Analysis was applied to set the interdependency among research fields and better understand the interrelation among the different topics. The key concepts of don't emerge clearly as an object of research and they will be included in future reflections about the transformative capacity of the city through sustainability and in the development of city strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Monitoring ground deformation at national and regional level with millimetre-scale precision, nowadays, is possible by using Advanced Differential Interferometric SAR (A-DInSAR) techniques. This study concerns the results of the European Ground Motion Service (EGMS), part of the Copernicus Land Monitoring Service, which detects and measures land displacement at European scale. This Service provides reliable and consistent information regarding natural ground motion phenomena such as landslides and subsidence. The ground motion is derived from Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) time-series analysis of Sentinel-1A/B data. These data, which provide full coverage of Europe from two different observation geometries (ascending and descending) every six days, are processed at full resolution. The paper is focused on the exploitation of the basic product of EGMS for both regional and local purposes. Analysing the slope and aspect of the deformation field is the novelty of this investigation. In particular, the focus is put on the generation of wide-area differential deformation maps. Such maps indicate the gradient of the deformation field. The obtained information is not only beneficial for monitoring anthropogenic phenomena but also vital for urban management and planning. Most of the significant damages to manmade structures and infrastructures are associated with high deformation gradient values. Thus, monitoring the temporal and spatial variations of deformation gradient is essential for dynamic analysis, early-warning, and risk assessment in urban areas. Although EGMS productions are prepared for monitoring at regional level, their resolutions are high enough to investigate at local level. Therefore, this paper considers the local deformations that affect single structures or infrastructures. Local differences in such deformation can indicate damages in the corresponding structures and infrastructures. We illustrate these types of analysis to generate differential deformation maps using datasets available at CTTC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim/purpose - The main purpose of the paper is the identification of opportunities and threats for city logistics development from a local authority perspective. Design/methodology/approach - The paper presents the original results of surveys conducted among city logistics experts from all over the world and among representa- tives of twelve EU capital cities. Findings - According to the study the most important opportunities for cities are stakeholders' willingness for cooperation, as well as a good and long cooperation with them. It shows that a local authority cannot introduce any solutions in the field of city logistics without cooperating with other stakeholders. Therefore, the lack of cooperation can be a threat. The other threat highlighted by the majority of studied cities is the lack of standards on data collections. Without information in real time on problems and activities undertaken by various stakeholders in the field of city logistics it is very difficult for strategic and tactical decisions to be made by a local authority. Research implications/limitations - The most significant limitation of the research was the sample of respondents. Despite the fact that the questionnaire was sent to 28 EU capital cites only 12 out of them have completed and returned the questionnaire. A further problem arises from the lack of standards on collecting information on city logistics by cities. As a result of it many European cities do not collect this information or do it in a fragmentary way. Originality/value/contribution - The research results introduced in the paper make a contribution to the theoretical and practical knowledge on city logistics development. It fills the gap related to the external factors affecting the development of city logistics. The author's concept of the framework for city logistics development with the inclusion of threats and opportunities and the set of questions can be a useful tool for local authorities as well as enriching the theoretical background for city logistics strategic planning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper brings into the spotlight the concept of smart city, emerging from major economic, social and environmental considerations and developed to provide new possibilities for the inhabitants, but also to limit the impact of human activities on the environment. Thus, the authors initiate a presentation of attempts to define the smart city, highlighting the six dimensions on its development in a sustainable context. Moreover, as one of the greatest challenges of mankind today is to ensure the increasing demand for energy by maintaining the balance with the environment, the paper highlights aspects regarding the use of a form of renewable energy, known as bioenergy. This is one of the key factors for ensuring the sustainable development of smart cities and beyond. Taking into account that smart cities have a smart energy approach, in the last part of the paper the authors present ways to integrate bioenergy into the functioning of such urban areas in Europe and build a map of smart European cities which make use of bioenergy in the benefit of population's consumption. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Featured Application: Drones can be a very useful tool to help mosquito control tasks in areas where these insects are an important vector of disease transmission. Storing sterile mosquitoes in drones and releasing them in targeted areas where previous suppression of wild populations has been performed can be a major advance in this methodology. This is part of the sterile insect techniques (SIT) which have been demonstrated to be an environmentally friendly solution for the control of insect pests. However, the use of drones in the areas where these operations are foreseen is limited by the fact that we have a regulation that advances at a slower pace than technology. Of particular interest is the case of the suppression of mosquito populations in urban areas below the transmission threshold, where drones and their operating conditions must meet demanding safety requirements. This article presents the current regulatory situation in Europe that affects drone operations and its applicability to the case of the release of sterile mosquitoes to control the population of these insects in two different scenarios: urban and rural areas. In recent years, several countries have developed the use of sterile insect techniques (SIT) to fight against mosquitoes that transmit diseases. From a technical and economic point of view, the use of drones in the aerial release of sterile mosquitoes leads to important improvements in aerial coverage and savings in operational costs due to the requirement of fewer release sites and field staff. However, these operations are under the European drone regulation, one of the most advanced in the world. The main contribution and novelty of this paper with respect to previous work is the analysis of the SIT application with drones under the European risk-based regulation in two scenarios: urban and rural areas. The specific operations risk assessment (SORA) methodology has been applied to assess the risk of drone operations in these scenarios. The paper presents the operational requirements for aerial release of mosquitoes with drones along with the regulatory considerations that must be applied. Finally, an overview of the conditions in operation that could relax risks and mitigation measures is also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

European cities are currently facing one of the main evolutions of the last fifty years. 'Cities for the citizens' is the new leitmotiv of modern societies, and citizens are demanding, among others, a greener environment including non-polluted air. Improved sensors and improved communication systems open the door to the design of new systems based on citizen science to better monitor the air quality. In this paper, we present a system that relies on the already available Copernicus Environment Service, on Air Quality Monitoring reference stations and on a cluster of new low-cost, low-energy sensor nodes that will improve the resolution of air quality maps. The data collected by this system will be stored in a time series database, and it will be available both to city council managers for decision making and to citizens for informative purposes. In this paper, we present the main challenges imposed by Air Quality Monitoring systems, our proposal to overcome those challenges, and the results of our preliminary tests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The positive energy district (PED) is a rather recent concept that aims to contribute to the main objectives of the Energy Union strategy. It is based on an integrated multi-sectoral approach in response to Europe's most complex challenges. But to what extent have its development and implementation been supported by research and innovation programs? And what is the state of the art of its implementation and effective penetration into the current energy systems of European cities, according to the evidence provided by the scientific literature? This study aims to investigate these issues, providing a critical overview of the PED situation by means of a systematic literature review based on the use of open-access bibliometric software supplemented with content analysis. The results show that less than half of the documents analyzed refer to actual case studies, 80% of which were funded as part of research projects. This seems to lead to the conclusion that although PEDs have been strongly encouraged by the scientific community and policy initiatives at the European level, their implementation in cities is still limited. Moreover, an uneven distribution among countries can be observed. To overcome the existing barriers to PED diffusion and implementation, it would be useful to provide more ad hoc funding and, above all, facilitate its accessibility also by municipalities not yet well integrated into European projects, initiatives, and networks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changes in urban residential density represent an important issue in terms of land consumption, the conservation of ecosystems, air quality and related human health problems, as well as the consequential challenges for urban and regional planning. It is the decline of residential densities, in particular, that has often been used as the very definition of sprawl, describing a phenomenon that has been extensively studied in the United States and in Western Europe. Whilst these studies provide valuable insights into urbanization processes, only a handful of them have reflected the uneven dynamics of simultaneous urban growth and shrinkage, using residential density changes as a key indicator to uncover the underlying dynamics. This paper introduces a contrasting analysis of recent developments in both de- and re-concentration, defined as decreasing or increasing residential densities, respectively. Using a large sample of European cities, it detects differences in density changes between successional population growth/decline. The paper shows that dedensification, found in some large cities globally, is not a universal phenomenon in growing urban areas; neither the increasing disproportion between a declining demand for and an increasing supply of residential areas nor actual concentration processes in cities were found. Thus, the paper provides a new, very detailed perspective on (de)densification in both shrinking and growing cities and how they specifically contribute to current land take in Europe. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the early 20th century, urban centers in New Jersey, especially locations such as Newark, Hoboken, and Camden, were home to many immigrants from Europe. Hoboken stands out amongst these as it was the major port of embarkation for American troops en route to the World War I. The city saw American immigrants supporting the war effort in varying ways. Irish immigrants, for example, may well have looked at American support for Great Britain in a different light than native-born American citizens. Similarly, German-Americans, especially between 1914 and 1917, were ambivalent as American "neutrality" towards Germany shifted towards outright hostility. What can local newspapers, some of which catered to ethnic interests, tell us about the tensions between ethnic loyalties and the call for patriotic support for the Allies as the United States went to war? This paper focuses in part on editorial comments on the need for "loyalty," and/or "patriotism" once war was declared in April, 1917. It was originally presented as a paper at the NJ Historical Commission's 2017 conference, "New Jersey and The Great War," held November 3-4, 2017 at Rowan College at Burlington County and Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A large amount of policy support is spent to foster the development of rural areas in Europe. However, empirical evidence on the well-being differential between rural and urban areas in Europe is scant and incomplete. The present study develops a systematic literature review on this topic, bridging a gap in research as a systematic analysis on the subject has not been developed as far as we know. It uses the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) method. The review focuses on definitions of rural-urban most used in the literature, main dimensions of well-being that are analyzed, nature of the data and, finally, evidence that emerged regarding the differences in the various dimensions of well-being between rural and urban populations. The analysis confirms that available evidence is controversial and provides advice on how to develop new and better empirical analyses on this topic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental noise has become one of the principal health risks for urban dwellers and road traffic noise (RTN) is considered to be the main source of these adverse effects. To address this problem, strategic noise maps and corresponding action plans have been developed throughout Europe in recent years in response to the European Noise Directive 2002/49/EC (END), especially in populated cities. Recently, wireless acoustic sensor networks (WASNs) have started to serve as an alternative to static noise maps to monitor urban areas by gathering environmental noise data in real time. Several studies have analysed and categorized the different acoustic environments described in the END (e.g., traffic, industrial, leisure, etc.). However, most of them have only considered the dynamic evolution of the A-weighted equivalent noise levels L A e q over different periods of time. In order to focus on the analysis of RTN solely, this paper introduces a clustering methodology to analyse and group spectro-temporal profiles of RTN collected simultaneously across an area of interest. The experiments were conducted on two acoustic databases collected during a weekday and a weekend day through WASNs deployed in the pilot areas of the LIFE+ DYNAMAP project. The results obtained show that the clustering of RTN, based on its spectro-temporal patterns, yields different solutions on weekdays and at weekends in both environments, being larger than those found in the suburban environment and lower than the number of clusters in the urban scenario. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of such project was the analysis of population imbalances in Europe, their challenges, and opportunities, contrasting two different territorial trends: rural areas suffering from depopulation I versus i growing urban areas which increase the concentration of population. The authors support also the idea that a policy only focused on rural areas would fail. Increasingly population are concentrated in urban areas and their surroundings, while rural areas - not all - face depopulation. [Extracted from the article]

Copyright of Cuadernos Geograficos is the property of Cuadernos Geograficos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Knowledge-intensive services (KIS) are assuming an increasing importance in innovation, to such an extent that they have even classified as "key agents" within innovation systems (Fischer, 2001). As one of the major features of KIS is coproduction, location is expected to play a significant role on the effects of KIS on regional innovation systems. The objective of this paper is to examine the relationship between the location of KIS and the innovation performance of the European regions. Starting from the results reached by previous studies: Makun and McPherson (1997) for three New York regions, Muller and Zenker (1998) for five German and French regions, Drejer and Vinding (2003) for Danish urban areas or Simmie and Strambach (2006) for large cities of England and Germany, our aim is to widen the traditional scope of the analysis and evaluate the relationship between location of KIS and innovation performance on an European basis. More concretely we try to show that the spatial concentration of KIS in some regions (and particular in capital cities) contributes to foster innovation. To do so we carry out an exploratory spatial analysis for more than 100 European regions. We take as a proxy for the location of KIS the share of employment in KIS in every region. The results obtained support the hypothesis that KIS exert a positive impact on regional innovation performance, an impact that could spill over into the neighbouring regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Cuadernos Geograficos is the property of Cuadernos Geograficos and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Pluvial flooding is a result of overland flow and ponding before the runoff enters any watercourse, drainage system or sewer, or cannot enter it because the network is full to capacity, usually caused by intense rainfall. River and coastal floods get the most attention since they are largest and last the longest, while pluvial floods are relatively marginalized in research. Therefore, the main goal of this research was to show risk posed by pluvial floods, their connection to current global climate change processes, present effects of flooding in European cities, as well as what we can expect in the future. Furthermore, the aims were to present and get more familiar with scientific projects, strategies, directives and measures devised both on national and international levels, that deal with urban pluvial flood issues across the European continent. Climate change projections indicate that there will be an increase in the frequency and intensity of rainfall events throughout Europe and along with ongoing urbanization, the problem of pluvial flooding will most certainly require more attention, which it is starting to receive. Some countries have already developed their strategies and initiatives and implemented both structural and non-structural measures, such as spatial planning, constructional measures, information systems, reducing land sealing through policies, building codes and standards, on-site improvement of retention, infiltration, evaporation, and rainfall water recycling with the use of green roofs, permeable or porous pavements, rain gardening or urban rainwater harvesting. At the same time, there are numerous research papers, studies, conferences and workshops devoted to the problem of pluvial flooding and its management carried out in an attempt to properly deal with this hazard. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over the past few decades many urban leaders have searched for an appropriate policy response to tackle urban decay. Various kinds of flagship projects emerged in many cities as the products of a property-led approach to the regeneration strategies adopted by local governments in North American and European cities. It was expected that the creation of high-profile milieux would launch chain reactions which would eventually lead to the regeneration of declining neighbourhoods. The focus of this study lies in the anatomy of physical transformation in an inner city neighbourhood within the context of post-socialist transition. In particular, the paper discusses the flagship role of the Golden Angel commercial centre in the physical upgrading of the Smíchov district in Prague. The case study contributes to the understanding of complex circumstances and mechanisms of revitalization in the post-socialist inner city. The empirical material is based on field observations, expert opinions and existing documents. The paper shows that a high-profile project can be one of the driving forces in physical revitalization through the provision of symbolic power, credibility and appeal to a declining neighbourhood. At the same time, it is emphasize that physical transformation is a multi-conditional and context-related process rather than an automatic and straightforward outcome of flagship developments. Successful revitalization depends on a favourable constellation of various factors. On the local level, the key factors include the development potential of the location, the attitude of the local authorities and the commitment of all involved actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Situated in the context of recent geographical engagements with ‘landscape’, this paper combines ‘morphological’ and ‘iconographic’ landscape interpretations to examine how urban forms were perceived in late medieval Europe. To date, morphological studies have mapped the medieval city either by classifying urban layouts according to particular types, or by analysing plan forms of particular towns and cities to reveal their spatial evolution. This paper outlines a third way, an ‘iconographic’ approach, which shows how urban forms in the Middle Ages conveyed Christian symbolism. Three such ‘mappings’ explore this thesis: the first uses textual and visual representations which show that the city was understood as a scaled-down world - a microcosm - linking city and cosmos in the medieval mind; the second ‘mapping’ develops this theme further and suggests that urban landscapes were inscribed with symbolic form through their layout on the ground; while the third looks at how Christian symbolism of urban forms was performed through the urban landscape in perennial religious processions. Each of these ‘mappings’ points to the symbolic, mystical significance urban form had in the Middle Ages, based on religious faith, and they thus offer a deepened appreciation of how urban landscapes were represented, constructed and experienced at the time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current urban and transport planning practices have significant negative health, environmental, social and economic impacts in most cities. New urban development models and policies are needed to reduce these negative impacts. The Superblock model is one such innovative urban model that can significantly reduce these negative impacts through reshaping public spaces into more diverse uses such as increase in green space, infrastructure supporting social contacts and physical activity, and through prioritization of active mobility and public transport, thereby reducing air pollution, noise and urban heat island effects. This paper reviews key aspects of the Superblock model, its implementation and initial evaluations in Barcelona and the potential international uptake of the model in Europe and globally, focusing on environmental, climate, lifestyle, liveability and health aspects. We used a narrative meta-review approach and PubMed and Google scholar databases were searched using specific terms. The implementation of the Super block model in Barcelona is slow, but with initial improvement in, for example, environmental, lifestyle, liveability and health indicators, although not so consistently. When applied on a large scale, the implementation of the Superblock model is not only likely to result in better environmental conditions, health and wellbeing, but can also contribute to the fight against the climate crisis. There is a need for further expansion of the program and further evaluation of its impacts and answers to related concerns, such as environmental equity and gentrification, traffic and related environmental exposure displacement. The implementation of the Superblock model gained a growing international reputation and variations of it are being planned or implemented in cities worldwide. Initial modelling exercises showed that it could be implemented in large parts of many cities. The Superblock model is an innovative urban model that addresses environmental, climate, liveability and health concerns in cities. Adapted versions of the Barcelona Superblock model are being implemented in cities around Europe and further implementation, monitoring and evaluation are encouraged. The Superblock model can be considered an important public health intervention that will reduce mortality and morbidity and generate cost savings for health and other sectors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since the launch of TROPOMI on the Sentinel-5 Precursor (S5P) satellite, NO 2 observations have become available with a resolution of 3.5× 5 km, which makes monitoring NO x emissions possible at the scale of city districts and industrial facilities. For Europe, emissions are reported on an annual basis for country totals and large industrial facilities and made publicly available via the European Environment Agency (EEA). Satellite observations can provide independent and more timely information on NO x emissions. A new version of the inversion algorithm DECSO (Daily Emissions Constrained by Satellite Observations) has been developed for deriving emissions for Europe on a daily basis, averaged to monthly mean maps. The estimated precision of these monthly emissions is about 25 % for individual grid cells. These satellite-derived emissions from DECSO have been compared to the officially reported European emissions and spatial–temporal disaggregated emission inventories. The country total DECSO NO x emissions are close to the reported emissions and the emissions compiled by the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS). Comparison of the spatially distributed NO x emissions of DECSO and CAMS showed that the satellite-derived emissions are often higher in cities, while they are similar for large power plants and slightly lower in rural areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Universitas Humanística is the property of Pontificia Universidad Javeriana and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Cities are major drivers of environmental change at all scales and are especially at risk from the ensuing effects, which include poor air quality, flooding and heat waves. Typically, these issues are studied on a city-by-city basis owing to the spatial complexity of built landscapes, local topography and emission patterns. However, to ensure knowledge sharing and to integrate local-scale processes with regional and global scale modelling initiatives, there is a pressing need for a world-wide database on cities that is suited for environmental studies. In this paper we present a European database that has a particular focus on characterising urbanised landscapes. It has been derived using tools and techniques developed as part of the World Urban Database and Access Portal Tools (WUDAPT) project, which has the goal of acquiring and disseminating climate-relevant information on cities worldwide. The European map is the first major step toward creating a global database on cities that can be integrated with existing topographic and natural land-cover databases to support modelling initiatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research underlines the importance of mobility management tools and small-scale targeted interventions of public space upgrades in order to encourage conscious sustainable mobility behaviour. The paper reviews tools and tactics of soft transport policy measures, as well as of small-scale and low-cost public space design approaches and strategies in the USA and Europe to assess their characteristics and results. It will then focus on Thessaloniki (Greece) presenting 1) the main findings of a trip survey concerning the impact of the economic crisis on mobility behaviour and 2) the shift to low-cost street scale urban design projects which have emerged during the crisis. The paper states that quality public space and urban transport constitute conditions necessary to attain long-term change in mobility behaviour. While the importance of hard transport policy measures should not be underestimated, the strategy for achieving sustainable urban mobility and public space design adapted to the economic crisis-specific conditions is discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper regards specific context of public spaces in "shadow" of tall buildings located in European cities. Majority of tall buildings in European cities were built in last 15 years. Tall buildings appear mainly in city centres, directly at important public spaces being viable environment for inhabitants with variety of public functions (open spaces, green areas, recreation places, shops, services etc.). All these amenities and services are under direct impact of extensive shading coming from the tall buildings. The paper focuses on analyses and representation of impact of shading from tall buildings on various public spaces in cities using 3D city models. Computer environment of 3D city models in cityGML standard uses 3D LiDAR data as one of data types for definition of 3D cities. The structure of cityGML allows analytic applications using existing computer tools, as well as developing new techniques to estimate extent of shading coming from high-risers, affecting life in public spaces. These measurable shading parameters in specific time are crucial for proper functioning, viability and attractiveness of public spaces -- finally it is extremely important for location of tall buildings at main public spaces in cities. The paper explores impact of shading from tall buildings in different spatial contexts on the background of using cityGML models based on core LIDAR data to support controlled urban development in sense of viable public spaces. The article is prepared within research project 2TaLL: Application of 3D Virtual City Models in Urban Analyses of Tall Buildings, realized as a part of Polish-Norway Grants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While concentrations of most air pollutants have been decreasing in Europe over the last 20 years, O 3 is showing variable trends, with increasing average and decreasing peak concentrations. The complexity of O 3 chemistry adds to the difficulty of understanding both the trends observed and how concentrations can be mitigated. This paper tries to answer the following questions: which emission sectors should be targeted and what levels of reduction could be achieved? To address these reflections, an Atlas of O 3 chemical regimes has been constructed. For this Atlas, 22 European cities were selected and the surrogate model Air Control Toolbox (ACT) was used to evaluate the simulated changes in several ozone metrics as a result of reductions in road transport and industrial emissions. O 3 chemical regimes have been classified and put in perspective with meteorological and emission data at each city location and around. The O 3 sensitivity to road transport and industrial emissions differ from one city to another, but also for the same city when considering different ozone metrics and seasons (e.g., annual means versus SOMO35 or summer peaks). Counterproductive impacts yielding O 3 increase when emissions are reduced are mainly encountered in regions or periods where O 3 concentration are relatively low. In terms of meteorological factors, O 3 chemical regimes are mostly impacted by the amount of solar radiation received but wind speed also has a considerable impact. Most cases show a higher sensitivity to emission reductions from road transport or equal sensitivity to emission reductions from road transport and industry. Very few cases are more sensitive to emissions from the industrial sector. However, the response of annual or seasonal average O 3 metrics to industrial and road transport emissions can be considered relatively low with a maximum reduction of 33% for a 100% reduction of both industrial and road transport emissions. This is because anthropogenic emission can only mitigate ozone above a substantial natural tropospheric background. It is precisely this incremental anthropogenic ozone, which should be targeted by efficient policies as we also demonstrate that none of the cities studied would exceed the European target value with a 100% reduction in emissions. • An atlas of ozone chemical regimes has been constructed for 22 European cities. • O 3 sensitivity to road transport and industrial emissions differ when considering different ozone metrics and different periods of the year. • Counterproductive effects of precursors emission reductions on ozone are a concern where and when ozone concentrations are low. • On the contrary, significant reductions of precursor emissions are found to reduce the number of exceedances of the EU target limit value. • In most cities, mitigation of road transport yields larger benefit to ozone air pollution than mitigation of the industrial sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a previous study, we assessed the efficiency of reducing either traffic or industrial emissions on various ozone metrics for several cities in Europe, based on the Air Control Toolbox surrogate model. Here, we perform various model parametrisation sensitivity analyses in order to assess the robustness of our results. We find that increasing the model resolution has a limited impact on the ozone response to emission changes when focusing on concentration peaks but strongly changes the response of the ozone daily mean with a switch to a titration regime for all zones with significant nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions. The impact of pollution imported from outside the simulation domain was also studied and we show that if the first lever for action on ozone peaks remains as the reduction of local and regional emissions, in order to achieve higher levels of reduction, it is necessary to act at a European level. We also explore more up-to-date temporal profiles and sectoral emission speciation and find a shift towards a more NOx-limited regime in a number of cities. Overall, these sensitivity tests show that most of the differences are simulated in cities with high NOx emissions and little solar radiation but do not change the overall conclusions that were previously obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main purpose of this article is to identify and classify smart and sustainable urban mobility solutions in the context of three narratives for sustainable mobility: electromobility, collective transport 2.0 and low-mobility societies. The research process of this study included the following methods: review of the literature, namely, strategic European documents, sustainable urban mobility plans in chosen cities and scientific publications addressing smart and sustainable mobility, case studies of selected cities in Europe and technology mapping to visualize the study results. The main result of this study is the review of various smart and sustainable urban solutions (SSUM) and their classification within the three narratives of electromobility, collective transport 2.0 and low-mobility societies. This article expands the concept of the three narratives for sustainable mobility with the aspect of smart mobility enriched with the variety of example solutions, case studies and good practices within mobility strategies in European cities. The study results can be useful for different stakeholders engaged in developing and introducing the sustainable mobility strategies in cities. Based on the catalogue of SSUM solutions, presented case studies and good practices, they may gain the necessary knowledge, consider the possible initiatives towards green transformation in cities and finally adjust them to the citizens' need. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The post-2008 economic recovery period has seen varying degrees of improvement in the well-being of young individuals across different countries, regions, and cities of the EU. This study contributes to the literature on the geography of well-being by examining the impact of urban economic contexts on the subjective well-being of youth in Europe, a topic that has received limited attention so far. Specifically, we investigate how the local economic context has affected financial satisfaction among the young (15-35 age group) in European cities during the recovery period after the economic crisis. We study whether living in a city with better opportunities in the labor market, on the housing market, or with better local services (e.g., education or health care) affect financial satisfaction among the young. We carried out multilevel analysis of financial satisfaction among young adults on data from the Quality of Life in European Cities survey (years 2012, 2015, 2019), which asks about aspects of quality of life among a representative sample of the population in a large number of cities in EU Member States. Overall, the results suggest that a better labor market context (where it is in general easier to find a job) has a statistically significant positive effect on financial satisfaction among the young. Our results also show that satisfaction with the financial situation among young adults is significantly higher in cities with a higher quality of local social services. On the other hand, we have found only small (and statistically non-significant) contextual effect related to the local housing market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We use a spatial error model to test the EKC hypothesis on European cities. • The sample is a balanced panel of 922 European cities from 2000 to 2020. • We test CO 2 and SO 2 emissions, PM 2.5 and O 3 concentration and artificial land use. • Depending on the environmental indicator, the EKC takes on different shapes. • Participation in Transnational City Networks can affect EKC curvature. This paper empirically explores the extent to which European cities are on track to sustainable development by examining the environmental performance of a large sample of cities observed during the last two decades. The paper builds on the Environmental Kuznets Curve framework and leverages satellite data to build a set of environmental indicators as varied and as granular as possible. Evidence suggests that European cities are, on average, on track to sustainable development, meaning that the contribution of their economic growth to environmental degradation is already negative or close to becoming so. The paper also examines Transnational City Networks as accelerators of environmental transition. The results suggest that cities participating in such networks anticipate the transition with respect to their peers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to provide an assessment of urban quality of life (QoL) of European cities from the perspective of qualified human resources. The competitiveness of cities relies increasingly in their capacity to attract highly educated workers, as they are important assets for firms when choosing a location. Qualified human resources, on the other hand, tend to value QoL over other urban features. This is why policymakers and urban planners need to evaluate QoL of cities and be provided with tools that can guide action to improvements in this area. We assess urban QoL by means of a composite indicator constructed using data envelopment analysis, based on Urban Audit data and Mercer's framework of analysis, to give account of 246 European cities. Besides presenting a ranking of the best and the worst scores of QoL, this methodology allows benchmarking strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The urban migration in the North American cities and many European cities displays a great diversity of urban ethnic landscapes. These territories do not just show to the concentration of resident foreign-born population in certain areas inside the cities or in the suburbs but also the relevance of the economic activities developed by the immigrants. The role of migrant entrepreneurs has been critical in the revitalization of certain derelict urban cores and peripheries which have been transformed sometimes into vibrant ethnic business spaces. Some of these spaces show the importance of concentration of ethnic businesses and coethnic residents; some others present different geographic patterns, such as concentration or dispersion of ethnic businesses among a non-coethnic population; other times it is the concentration of specialized businesses. The combination of the different factors: concentration vs dispersion, diversity vs specialization and the majority vs minority relationship between ethnic businesses and the residents (monoethnicity vs multiethnicity) creates a set of different types of ethnic business spaces. The paper will explain theses types of ethnic business spaces with examples, such as Petite Asie in Paris, or multiethnic Ravalistan in Barcelona's old town, and the geographical factors that are shaping them. The methodology is based upon a review of contemporary literature and other research findings on ethnic landscapes mainly in metropolitan North America but also in European cities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to emphasize the importance of the spatial dimension of societal processes, the challenge of social cohesion, and social segregation in European cities. We shall focus here on the concept of territorial cohesion, the multiple socio-spatial patterns of European cities, and the European discourse on spatial planning and/or territorial governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While global migration is increasing, internal EU migration flows have only increased slowly. This paper contributes to a better understanding of the determinants and scale of European migration. It surveys previous historical experiences and empirical findings including the recent Eastern enlargements. The determinants of migration before and after the 2004 enlargement and in the EU 15 and EU 10 countries are analysed using individual data on migration intentions. In addition, perceptions about the size of migration after the enlargement are studied. The potential emigrant from both old and new EU member states lends to be young, better educated and to live in larger cities. People from the EU10 with children are less likely to move after enlargement in comparison to those without family. There exists correlation between individual perceptions about the scale of migration and actual flows. Better-educated and left-oriented individuals in the EU 15 are less likely to perceive these flows as important. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Migration & Ethnic Themes: MET / Migracijske i Etničke Teme is the property of Institute for Migration & Ethnic Studies and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of Technical Transactions / Czasopismo Techniczne is the property of Sciendo and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The present text is focused on an actual problem of planting of inappropriate tree taxa in many cities. It explains the causes of contaminated soils by winter salt management and principles of the toxic effect on plants. The paper summarizes the problem and brings solution. Town places with salt-contaminated soil should not be fitted with: spruce (Picea), pine (Pinus), linden (Tilia) and maples (Acer). On the other hand, resistant species are: ash (Fraxinus), poplar (Populus), willow (Salix), silverberry (Eleagnus), black locust (Robinia). Both lists of sensitive and salt-tolerant tree species have been presented. Salt-tolerant tree should be preferred before all the others species. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a new approach to evaluate sustainable energy consumption in selected European countries for the industrial sector and to identify which country is leading in this respect. Energy consumption has been on a continuously rising trend due to industrial development, migration of people from rural to urban areas and growing energy demand in the service sector. Therefore, it is essential to increase the share of renewable sources in energy consumption because it allows reducing the share of non-renewable sources, which significantly contribute to carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere. The assessment of the effectiveness of actions taken to improve the sustainability of energy consumption requires the consideration of many different criteria. The practical usefulness of multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) methods in this task has been proven in the literature. The structure of the model evaluated was based on criteria made available by the European Statistical Office (EUROSTAT). The study was conducted using four MCDA methods (TOPSIS, VIKOR, COMET and PROMETHEE II). The results obtained proved the usefulness and adequacy of the selected MCDA methods in assessing the problem in question. It was possible to clearly identify the country with the most sustainable energy consumption in terms of the established principles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]