Soil sealing is a worldwide phenomenon of covering of natural or seminatural soil with impervious surfaces, such as built-up or paved surfaces. It is widely recognized as a major environmental issue which drives landscape fragmentation and ecosystem services degradation and loss. Italy is one of European countries with the highest extent of soil sealing. The most affected area is northern Italy, especially the Po Valley with more than 12% of sealed surfaces. According to official data, Veneto Region and the city of Padua are seriously affected by this phenomenon. The Biotope Area Factor is a consolidated ecological urban index for mapping soil sealing, adopted in different European cities to support urban planning; it expresses the ratio of the ecologically effective surface area in relation to the total land area according to land cover classes. The general aim of this study is to map and to assess soil sealing in the whole municipal territory of Padua using the Biotope Area Factor (BAF) index. We tested and adopted a digital land cover map together with aerial images to perform a BAF analysis on the whole municipal territory of Padua. By using sample areas previously analyzed, we validated our source data by a double spatial validation process; therefore, soil sealing analysis was scaled-up to the municipality territory. Results show that in the city of Padua, the average BAF index value is 0.6; totally permeable surfaces (BAF = 1) cover 59.5%, whereas totally “sealed” surfaces (BAF = 0) are 40.3% of the municipal territory (93 km²). Most of the sealed soil is located in the east sector and in the historical core of the city, with BAF values ranging from 0 to 0.2. A particularly critical area is identified within the new industrial area of the city, which is strongly affected by soil sealing. BAF maps are useful tools to identify critical areas by geovisualizing surface permeability at a very detailed scale and by enabling further analyses for hydrogeological risk assessment and urban climate regulation. Moreover, the use of BAF maps at urban scale today represent an important tool for urban management, especially for policy makers who are planning mitigation and compensation measures to control soil sealing.

This article examines the application of nature-based solutions in stormwater management in the context of the Global South, focusing on a co-created green infrastructure plan and a pilot intervention project in the city of Paranoá-DF, Brazil. Urban challenges such as extreme floods, droughts, landslides, heatwaves, and biodiversity loss call for innovative planning strategies to enhance adaptation and resilience. The research methodology combined technical analyses, field work, community participation, and stormwater runoff modelling to develop integrated and culturally sensitive solutions to the city’s environmental and socio-economic challenges. This article then presents the outcomes of the community-based participatory workshops, which informed the definition of a green and blue infrastructure network incorporating a range of NBS. Community-identified priorities were used to design urban landscape interventions aimed at enhancing water-related ecosystem services and improving quality of life. Additionally, and supported by hydrological modelling, this article details a localised landscape intervention project that provides new perspectives on urban resilience in this context. Acknowledging the unique challenges faced by cities in the Global South—where social inequities and infrastructure deficits intersect with environmental vulnerabilities—this study highlights the importance of adapting NBS to the contexts of precarious urbanisation patterns. With hydrological stress expected to intensify under climate change, the proposed solutions address the heightened risks faced by low- and middle-income households, promoting more equitable and sustainable urban transformations.

This article introduces a methodology to evidence the current attractiveness level of Italian high-speed railway stations in a GIS environment, involving station services and flow parameters. The model has been relevant to detect stations with lower attractive capacity, and afterward, to implement the station attractivity, the work proposed employing a coworking spaces strategy as a service in station. Coworking spaces produce benefits both for the traveler and the transport company. These places became part of the services offered within railway stations since they are flow providers able to change appearance and idea of experience at station. In France, a coworking strategy has been created from the collaboration of Regus, leader company in coworking spaces supply, and the French railway group (SNCF). The Italian railway company (Ferrovie dello Stato) does not consider the attractiveness potential of coworking in the management of station resources; coworking spaces in Italy are placed outside stations. Accordingly, Torino Porta Susa station has been identified as one of the stations with low attractivity capacity from the methodology implemented, and it has been chosen as the case study to implement the coworking strategy. The choice of Torino Porta Susa is accurate also for showing the value of associating coworking as urban policies support. The coworking strategy can implement attractiveness levels and, in a long-term future perspective, encourage sustainable mobility targets.

Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) are increasingly implemented to address urban environmental challenges, yet the surrounding spatial context in which they are embedded may influence the conditions supporting their ecological functioning. This study applied an integrated remote sensing-based spatial diagnostic framework combining Sentinel-2 spectral indices and land-cover composition metrics to characterize and compare the surrounding environments of five NBS sites in Oslo, Riga, Milan, St. Gallen, and Lublin. The Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Normalized Difference Moisture Index (NDMI), and Normalized Difference Built-Up Index (NDBI) were analyzed within 100 m, 300 m, and 500 m buffer zones alongside land-cover composition assessments. The analysis revealed substantial variation in vegetation greenness, moisture conditions, built-up intensity, and landscape composition. Three spatial-context profiles were identified: low-density/peri-urban settings, exemplified by the Riga NBS site with consistently high NDVI (0.483–0.374), positive NDMI (0.230–0.171), and strongly negative NDBI (−0.230 to −0.171); mixed urban settings, represented by the Oslo, Lublin, and St. Gallen NBS sites; and dense urban settings, represented by the Milan NBS site, which exhibited the lowest NDVI (0.197–0.124), declining NDMI (0.054 to −0.014), and positive NDBI beyond 300 m (0.001–0.014). These findings demonstrate that surrounding landscape characteristics provide a meaningful basis for distinguishing urban NBS settings. The proposed replicable framework can support context-sensitive planning by identifying areas where complementary landscape-scale measures, including de-paving, strategic greening, and improved landscape connectivity, may be considered to strengthen the broader environmental conditions surrounding NBS.