Urban and Rural Development Planning for Resilient Human Environments

Dear Colleagues,

Resilient human environments reflect the need for both everyday quality of life as well as efficacy and accessibility in moments and periods of drastic change due to uncertainty. On a daily basis, environments allow the adaptation to social and natural changes, helping to increase the access to services as well as the velocity and effectiveness of adaptation to change and general living standards. Attention to universal design, green principles, recreation and accessibility services, social spaces, lifelong learning and socialization opportunities, housing adequate for different needs and environments, etc. can directly impact inclusiveness, energy efficiency, mobility, and standard of living prospects that can be more accessible to all (especially to vulnerable groups) and adapted to climate changes and energy crisis.

The environment also faces increasing natural and anthropogenic threats—climate change, extreme weather, flooding, landslides, desertification, earthquakes, wars, emergency migrations, etc.—as well as increasingly densely inhabited spaces. New technologies offer opportunities for prediction and monitoring, and new awareness and attitude towards uncertainties offer new opportunities for their management and spatial planning.

To make human environments more resilient, new tools for spatial management, spatial and sectorial planning, and design are needed to increase the general quality of life; develop improvement and adaptation strategies for changing environments; and to improve preparedness for uncertainty, response, and recovery.

The aim of this Special Issue is to provide an overview of new approaches to changing environments—conceptualization, tools, technologies, and methodologies—to answer the need of improving the quality of human environments as well as their potential to adapt to environmental changes (slow or fast). This is related to the aims of the journal:

• Landscapes, landscape design and landscape planning;
• Land–climate interactions, including climate–biosphere–biodiversity interactions;
• Urban contexts, urban–rural interactions and urban planning and development;
• Assessment and evaluation frameworks, indicators, indices, methods, tools and approaches (ecosystem services, multifunctionality and sustainability);
• Emerging technologies of data processing (deep learning/machine-based learning).

Suggested themes:

• Social, ecological and cultural aspects in the resilience of urban or rural environments;
• Climate adaptation in spatial planning, design, and construction;
• Uncertainty adaptation and management in spatial planning, building, and construction design for resilient human environments;
• Accessibility and health for resilient human urban and rural environments;
• Sustainability goals for resilient human environments;
• Landscape and buildings for resilient human environments;
• New technologies, strategies, and tools for resilient human environments.

For this Special Issue, we welcome the submission of both original research and review papers.

Prof. Dr. Iva Mrak
Prof. Dr. Giovanna Acampa
Dr. Maurizio Errigo
Guest Editors

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.

• quality of life in human environments
• resilient human environments
• climate adaptation
• spatial, urban and rural planning and evaluations
• building and construction design
• uncertainty adaptation, preparedness, response, recovery
• vulnerable groups and resilient human environments
• sustainability goals
• landscapes
• tools for resilient human environments

• Urban and Rural Development Planning for Resilient Human Environments (Second Edition) in Land