The Role of Biophilic Agents in Building a Green Resilient City; the Case of Birmingham, UK

Abstract

The present research offers an exploration into the biophilic approach and the role of its agents in urban planning in questions of building a green, resilient urban environment. Biophilia, the innate need of humans to connect with nature, coined by Edgar O. Wilson in 1984, is a concept that has been used in urban governance through institutions, agents’ behaviours, activities and systems to make the environment nature-inclusive. Therefore, it leads to green, resilient environments and to making cities more sustainable. Due to an increasing population, space within and around cities keeps on being urbanised, replacing natural land cover with concrete surfaces. These changes to land use influence and stress the environment, its components, and consequently impact the overall resilience of the space. To understand the interactions and address the adverse impacts these changes might have, it is necessary to identify and define the environment’s components: the institutions, systems, and agents. This paper exemplifies the biophilic approach through a case study in the city of Birmingham, United Kingdom and its biophilic agents. Using the categorisation of agents, the data obtained through in-situ interviews with local professionals provided details on the agent fabric and their dynamics with the other two environments’ components within the climate resilience framework. The qualitative analysis demonstrates the ways biophilic agents act upon and interact within the environment in the realm of urban planning and influence building a climate-resilient city. Their activities range from small-scale community projects for improving their neighbourhood to public administration programs focusing on regenerating and regreening the city. From individuals advocating for and educating on biophilic approach, to private organisations challenging the business-as-usual regulations, it appeared that in Birmingham the biophilic approach has found its representatives in every agent category. Overall, the activities they perform in the environment define their role in building resilience. Nonetheless, the role of biophilic agents appears to be one of the major challengers to the urban design’s status quo and the business-as-usual of urban governance. Researching the environment, focused on agents and their behaviour and activities based on nature as inspiration in addressing climate change on a city level, is an opposite approach to searching and addressing the negative impacts of human activity on the environment. This focus can provide visibility of the local human activities that enhance resilience, while these are becoming a valuable input to city governance and planning, with the potential of scaling it up to other cities and on to regional, national, and global levels.

Transformation towards Green Cities: Key Conditions to Accelerate Change

“…Johnson et al [15] stated that drivers of change on the meso level can arise from different levels in the system, both being social and ecological, and combinations of that Juri [16] added the technical element, defining the meso level as a socio-technical-ecological system (STES). Decisions for changing the system are made in a multi-level governance system, which entails actors, often change agents on different levels, finding each other and proposing solutions that work throughout the different levels [10,15,[17][18][19][20][21][22]. Gorrissen et al [23] (p. 172) called this: "new practices, technologies that seek to profoundly change established unsustainable routines and perceptions towards more sustainable ones."…”

Psychophysiological Response According to the Greenness Index of Subway Station Space

“…Before the correspondence analysis, preference, level of interior landscape area recognition, attention restoration effect, and space image measured as continuous variables (interval ratio scale) were recoded to discrete variables (nominal scale). As such, "not preferred at all (1 point)" and "not preferred (2 points)" were recoded to "not preferred GI (1)", "moderate (3 points)" was recoded to "moderate GI (2)" and "preferred (4 points)" and "strongly preferred (5 points)" were recoded to "preferred GI (3)." For the level of interior landscape area recognition, "too low (1 point)" and "low (2 points)" were recoded to "small landscape area (1)", "suitable (3 points)" was recoded to "suitable landscape area (2)", and "high (4 points)" and "very high (5 points)" were recoded to "large landscape area (3)."…”

“…As such, "not preferred at all (1 point)" and "not preferred (2 points)" were recoded to "not preferred GI (1)", "moderate (3 points)" was recoded to "moderate GI (2)" and "preferred (4 points)" and "strongly preferred (5 points)" were recoded to "preferred GI (3)." For the level of interior landscape area recognition, "too low (1 point)" and "low (2 points)" were recoded to "small landscape area (1)", "suitable (3 points)" was recoded to "suitable landscape area (2)", and "high (4 points)" and "very high (5 points)" were recoded to "large landscape area (3)." For attention restoration effect, based on the total score (35 points), "7-20 points" was recoded to "low attention restoration effect (1)", "21-27 points" was recoded to "moderate attention restoration effect (2)", and "28-35 points" was recoded to "high attention restoration effect (3)."…”

“…For the level of interior landscape area recognition, "too low (1 point)" and "low (2 points)" were recoded to "small landscape area (1)", "suitable (3 points)" was recoded to "suitable landscape area (2)", and "high (4 points)" and "very high (5 points)" were recoded to "large landscape area (3)." For attention restoration effect, based on the total score (35 points), "7-20 points" was recoded to "low attention restoration effect (1)", "21-27 points" was recoded to "moderate attention restoration effect (2)", and "28-35 points" was recoded to "high attention restoration effect (3)." For space image, "1-2 points" were recoded to negative space image (e.g., "dark" for "bright-dark"), "moderate (3 points)" was recoded to "moderate (2)", and "4-5 points" was recoded to positive space image (e.g., "bright" for "bright-dark").…”

“…This shows that there is a need to improve existing closed and complex subway stations and propose strategies to modify subway stations for creating pleasant environments. Accordingly, the biophilic approach-the concept of bringing back nature in the cityhas emerged as a natural and holistic approach in urban environments through design and governance in recent years [3]. It is the most well-known greening and design approach among the public [4].…”