Consistent and optimized territorial planning, imply the use of numerous variables aimed at improving life quality and reduction of environmental impacts. The resilience of the territory to climate change threats is strongly linked to its progressive transformation. This fact is extremely evident in coastal systems, which are intrinsically fragile systems due to their high environmental value and strong anthropogenic pressure. The existing tools and techniques provide to outline future transformation effects through the scenarios analysis. This work has the objective to evaluate the effects of land use changes in the territory of the Abruzzo coast. The conversion from natural soils to artificial uses has a significant impact on several ecosystem services. The regulation services considered in this work are flood regulation, carbon storage and sequestration, and habitat for biodiversity. The first is directly connected to soil sealing which determines a reduction of water infiltration with the consequent overloading of the existing sewerage systems. The quantitative evaluation is made using the concept of surface runoff coefficient. Instead, the estimation of the last two ecosystem services has been made using InVEST (Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs) models, specifically the Carbon Storage and Sequestration model and the Habitat Quality model. The results show that Land Use Changes (2012–2018) caused a potential increase of 10% in runoff and an annual Carbon Sequestration loss estimated at about €820,000.

The earthquake in central Italy in 2016 led to a profound urban and natural landscape transformation. The role of territorial planning in this kind of situation is extremely important because it allows the orientation of future settlement choices through appropriate interpretative keys of the existing territorial dynamics. This work aims to analyze the effects of the planning choices made in the post-earthquake period in the seismic crater municipalities of the Umbria region. Using the InVEST models, these studies regard the comparison of the effects of in-force plans on ecosystem services such as habitat quality and carbon storage. The data about the mosaic of the municipal urban planning tools are derived from specific actions produced under two LIFE projects (SUNLIFE and IMAGINE). The comparison makes it possible to identify how and to what extent the transformative scenarios, linked to the new condition, change the spatial planning compared to the previous one and the effects on the provision of ecosystem services. The knowledge of the latter aspect allows optimization of the methods of urban transformation that will be implemented. Moreover, this process of optimizing the provision of essential ecosystem services could certainly play a key role in the enhancement and economic recovery of these areas.

The following paper examines urban and territorial planning in Italy, where decision-making is entrusted almost exclusively to the almost 8000 small municipalities present in the country. Plans for and the transformation of built-up areas, infrastructure and social services of all types, and serving all purposes in a national territory of more than 300,000 square kilometers, are controlled by a multitude of Mayors, Boards and Municipal Councils that govern plots of land consisting of polygons of a few kilometers per side. This is generally achieved using urban planning tools developed without any general rule or protocol. Often, most of their content is even ignored as a result of national legislation that weakens them, making them largely irrelevant. This is a European example of urban mismanagement that should be brought to the wider attention of the European technical–scientific community because the debate developed so far on this topic—even by eminent and authoritative urban planners—has been almost entirely published in Italian only. Public and political attention around the issue is still extremely limited, although the serious effects of this “molecular planning” are beginning to be perceived: unjustified overurbanization and very disorganized, extremely energy-intensive and ecosystemically destructive urban layouts that are completely at odds with the public interests of environmental and urban quality. In the following paper, we make some comparisons with other European countries and outline some possible directions—certainly very difficult to follow—to rethink and remedy these negative effects.

At a time when wars and pandemics have disrupted the world order and deeply damaged international agreements, more people are talking about the energy and food independence of the nation-states. It is clear that the achievement of these objectives will not be rapid, but it is also clear that land use must take account of these important aspects. The over-dimensioning of the settled areas presents illogically in almost all municipal urban planning plans regardless of their geographical location, demographic dynamics, and values of the administered territory; it certainly constitutes an obstacle to effective land use. The work presented here aims to analyze the effects on agricultural production of the transformations envisaged by the plans of the provinces of Modena and Reggio nell’Emilia, while also providing solutions that could promote the sustainability of the interventions planned in these areas of high agri-food value.

Today’s global challenges are increasingly complex, and forecast scenarios show a general increase in risks that could compromise human permanence in some areas of the planet. In this context, cities have a key role, both because they concentrate an increasing number of inhabitants and because they will be among the first areas to feel these effects. As pointed out by the IPCC, addressing these challenges requires a redefinition of the organization of urban spaces by assigning, more or less explicitly, a key role to spatial planning. Urban and territorial planning may be the main tool in the regulation of transformation processes. Planning has a crucial role, especially if territorial transformations are no longer mainly linked to expansive logics. In this case, it is possible to orient urban choices and policies towards a sustainable use of resources, including land resources that continue to be overexploited. Starting from these assumptions, the present work intends to analyze the relationship between the LST (Land Surface Temperature) extracted from the data provided by MODIS (Moderate-resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer) and the level of soil sealing within the municipality of Ferrara in northern Italy. The reference period is between 2015 and 2021. The objective is dual. The first is investigating how the environmental matrix can influence the temperature values detected; the second is investigating how the implementation of transformative forecasts provided by the urban planning tool in force, could influence the thermal comfort of the study area.