Green belt
Posted on:3/30/2006
| A green belt or greenbelt is an area of largely undeveloped wild or agricultural land surrounding or neighbouring an urban area. Similar concepts are greenways or green wedges which have a linear character and may run through an urban area instead of around it. |
In some countries, development in green belt areas is heavily restricted. Aims include:
1) protecting the natural environment;
2) improving air quality in urban areas;
3) ensuring that urban dwellers have easy access to the countryside, with consequent educational and recreational opportunities; and
4) protecting the unique character of rural communities which might otherwise be absorbed by expanding suburbs.
Sometimes, development jumps over the restricted greenbelt area, resulting in the creation of "satellite towns" which, although separated from the city by green space, function more like suburbs than independent communities.
The protection of green belts was pioneered in the United Kingdom, where there are fourteen green belt areas, covering 16,716 km², or 13% of England, and 164 km² in Scotland; for a detailed discussion of these, see Green Belt (UK). Another notable example is the Ottawa Greenbelt in Canada. The more general term in the U.S. is green space or greenspace, which may be a very small area such as a park. In fact, the concept of "Green Belt" has evolved in recent years to encompass not only "Greenspace" but also "Greenstructure", taking into account all urban greenspaces, an important aspect of sustainable development in the 21st. century. The European Commission's COST Action C11 (European Cooperation in the field of Scientific and Technical Research) is undertaking "Case studies in Greenstructure Planning" involving 15 European countries.
An act of the Swedish parliament from 1994 has declared a series of parks in Stockholm and the adjacent municipality of Solna to its north a "national city park" called Ekoparken (the "Eco park"; it stretches from the parks surrounding the royal palaces of Ulriksdal and Haga in Solna, through the Brunnsviken area, down to the former royal hunting grounds of North and South Djurgården).
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