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Land
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Redefining Cities and Planning under the Twin Smart and Green...
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Redefining Cities and Planning under the Twin Smart and Green Transition

A special issue of Land (ISSN 2073-445X). This special issue belongs to the section "Land Planning and Landscape Architecture".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 March 2025 | Viewed by 11082

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Nicos Komninos

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Urban and Regional Innovation Research (URENIO) Faculty of Engineering, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece
Interests: smart cities; intelligent cities; innovation systems; innovation strategy; urban and regional planning
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

An interdisciplinary theoretical formulation focuses on the ongoing transformation of cities and planning under the influence of the twin smart and green transition, bringing together contributions from urban studies, smart city systems, sustainability and climate change, spatial planning, transition management, and system innovation research. The digital (or smart) transition is a major driver of this transformation of cities and refers to the application of smart systems, sensor networks, IoT, cloud computing, big data, AI, and other digital technologies, which change all urban ecosystems, and planning strategies also. The green transition is another important driver of urban transformation with a systemic impact. Guided by objectives of sustainability, circularity, clean energy, and adaptation to climate change, it broadens the horizon of urban change due to its transversal nature across ecosystems, science disciplines, and spatial scales. The combined smart-green transition is shaping 21st-century cities and encompasses all urban ecosystems in the domains of manufacturing, energy, utilities, transport, services, and housing, though the conditions, technologies, science, and models of transformation are specific to each ecosystem and change from one to the other. The objective of the Special Issue is to look into these processes and assess whether new patterns of city organization and new planning models, which deviate radically from 20th-century cities, are forming under the impact of the twin transition. Following a “system-of-systems” perspective of cities, we invite original papers that discuss new organization and planning models for any city ecosystem. The Special Issue plans to give an overview of the most recent advances in the field of cities and planning, and identify emerging city patterns and models that allow mastering the transformation of cities driven by the twin digital and green transition as an opportunity for a radical change of city ecosystems, innovation leapfrogging, and system innovation.

Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

  • new structures in cities under the impact of the twin transition;
  • urban modeling using big data and real-time data; smart-green planning models for the 21st-century cities;
  • city readiness for climate change; mobility-as-a-service and re-organization of the mobility ecosystem;
  • planning for smart campuses;
  • planning for net zero cities and districts;
  • planning for vision zero to eliminate severe accidents;
  • positive energy cities and districts;
  • cyber-physical networks in urban innovation hubs.

Prof. Dr. Nicos Komninos
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Land is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • urban transformation
  • city ecosystem
  • city-as-a-platform
  • smart city
  • intelligent city
  • green city
  • climate-neutral city
  • net zero energy district
  • circular city
  • mobility-as-a-service
  • digital transition
  • green transition
  • city model
  • planning model

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Further information on MDPI's Special Issue polices can be found here.

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

20 pages, 1282 KiB  
Article
Promoting Green Transformations through Smart Engagement: An Assessment of 100 Citizen-Led Urban Greening Projects
by Eleni Oikonomaki, Ilektra Papadaki and Christina Kakderi
Land 2024, 13(4), 556; https://doi.org/10.3390/land13040556 - 22 Apr 2024
Viewed by 2188
Abstract
In the face of challenges like heatwaves, flooding, other extreme events, as well as increasing pollution and declining quality of life in cities, there is a growing demand for the preservation and expansion of urban green spaces, often driven by citizen-led transformations. This [...] Read more.
In the face of challenges like heatwaves, flooding, other extreme events, as well as increasing pollution and declining quality of life in cities, there is a growing demand for the preservation and expansion of urban green spaces, often driven by citizen-led transformations. This paper examines 100 urban greening projects initiated or supported by citizens globally, categorizing them according to the type of greenery, the stakeholders involved, the mode of implementation, and the use of smart technologies incorporated. We notice variations in green endeavors based on the stakeholders orchestrating them; most of the entirely citizen-led initiatives being aimed at the creation of urban farms and food growing, demonstrating the pressing need to secure food and self-determination in communities. More than half of the assessed initiatives that managed to scale up and multiply had public authorities providing a framework or a type of support for their development or an NGO or other organization providing expertise and mobilizing citizens at various stages. In terms of technological use, we mostly found that websites and social media platforms ease participatory endeavors and knowledge sharing of best practices, accelerating scaling efforts, while there is low integration of more advanced digital technologies, which, if used, could enable real-time monitoring of green spaces, inform evidence-based decision-making, and streamline processes in scaling up green initiatives. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Redefining Cities and Planning under the Twin Smart and Green Transition)
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21 pages, 2010 KiB  
Article
Data-Driven Intelligent Platforms—Design of Self-Sovereign Data Trust Systems
by Ana Balan, Andi Gabriel Tan, Karima Kourtit and Peter Nijkamp
Land 2023, 12(6), 1224; https://doi.org/10.3390/land12061224 - 13 Jun 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1916
Abstract
Urban areas provide the seedbed conditions for a variety of agglomeration advantages, including incubator conditions for the ICT sector. This study aims to present the foundations for a data-driven digital architecture based on the notion of open access platform organisations (e.g., platform cities). [...] Read more.
Urban areas provide the seedbed conditions for a variety of agglomeration advantages, including incubator conditions for the ICT sector. This study aims to present the foundations for a data-driven digital architecture based on the notion of open access platform organisations (e.g., platform cities). The principles of coordinated multi-actor data handling and exchange mechanisms centre in particular on privacy and confidentiality regulations. These are highlighted and tested on the basis of the data exchange architecture in a particular Industry 4.0 sector, viz., the medical–pharmaceutical sector. To cope with these issues, self-sovereign data trust systems are designed and tested using an OpenDSU data environment. Several building blocks of this architecture are presented and assessed. The conclusion of this study is that OpenDSU technology offers promising departures for handling privacy-sensitive and confidential data exchange in open platform organisations, such as smart cities. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Redefining Cities and Planning under the Twin Smart and Green Transition)
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23 pages, 8669 KiB  
Article
The Conceptual Framework of Smart TOD: An Integration of Smart City and TOD
by Liwei Bai, Lelong Xie, Chaoyang Li, Shengqiang Yuan, Dening Niu, Tao Wang, Zheng Yang and Yi Zhang
Land 2023, 12(3), 664; https://doi.org/10.3390/land12030664 - 11 Mar 2023
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 3498
Abstract
Smart City (SC) is a booming model of urban development with great potential, armed to be one of the urban development’s most powerful developing weapons. However, the development of SC is far from satisfactory. Therefore, finding new paths for SC becomes imperative. Transit [...] Read more.
Smart City (SC) is a booming model of urban development with great potential, armed to be one of the urban development’s most powerful developing weapons. However, the development of SC is far from satisfactory. Therefore, finding new paths for SC becomes imperative. Transit Oriented Development (TOD), which often focuses on the core areas of SC, is believed to be a substantial contributor to the development of SC. Nonetheless, the relationship between SC and TOD and the effects of TOD in promoting SC are rarely studied. In this study, we proposed a conceptual framework of Smart TOD (S-TOD), which could highlight TOD 5.0 but more than that. S-TOD is an integration of SC and TOD, utilizing the deconstructive method and the abductive method. We first defined S-TOD, which integrates SC and TOD as the twin sources. Then, we employed the concept of Deoxyribonucleic Acid (DNA) to construct S-TOD in a cross-boundary path as the connection between DNA and its twin subchains can perfectly reflect the inner relationship between S-TOD and its twin sources, SC and TOD. Finally, we built up the structure of S-TOD with three layers, i.e., the cloud layer, the tactile layer, and the land zones layer. The purpose of this paper is to enhance the practical value of SC, from a perspective that has been neglected, that is, the combination with TOD, provide a new perspective for the research and practice of the integration of SC and TOD, and effectively facilitate the advantages of SC and global sustainable development. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Redefining Cities and Planning under the Twin Smart and Green Transition)
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23 pages, 6025 KiB  
Article
Multisource Open Geospatial Big Data Fusion: Application of the Method to Demarcate Urban Agglomeration Footprints
by Nelunika Priyashani, Nayomi Kankanamge and Tan Yigitcanlar
Land 2023, 12(2), 407; https://doi.org/10.3390/land12020407 - 2 Feb 2023
Cited by 11 | Viewed by 1730
Abstract
Urban agglomeration is a continuous urban spread and generally comprises a main city at the core and its adjoining growth areas. These agglomerations are studied using different concepts, theories, models, criteria, indices, and approaches, where population distribution and its associated characteristics are mainly [...] Read more.
Urban agglomeration is a continuous urban spread and generally comprises a main city at the core and its adjoining growth areas. These agglomerations are studied using different concepts, theories, models, criteria, indices, and approaches, where population distribution and its associated characteristics are mainly used as the main parameters. Given the difficulties in accurately demarcating these agglomerations, novel methods and approaches have emerged in recent years. The use of geospatial big data sources to demarcate urban agglomeration is one of them. This promising method, however, has not yet been studied widely and hence remains an understudied area of research. This study explores using a multisource open geospatial big data fusion approach to demarcate urban agglomeration footprint. The paper uses the Southern Coastal Belt of Sri Lanka as the testbed to demonstrate the capabilities of this novel approach. The methodological approach considers both the urban form and functions related to the parameters of cities in defining urban agglomeration footprint. It employs near-real-time data in defining the urban function-related parameters. The results disclosed that employing urban form and function-related parameters delivers more accurate demarcation outcomes than single parameter use. Hence, the utilization of a multisource geospatial big data fusion approach for the demarcation of urban agglomeration footprint informs urban authorities in developing appropriate policies for managing urban growth. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Redefining Cities and Planning under the Twin Smart and Green Transition)
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