2. Architectural Composition for Urban Biodiversity: An Overlooked Potential
In recent years, several frameworks and disciplinary approaches have been developed globally to design greener cities. Landscape Urbanism (Mostafavi & Najle, 2003) (Waldheim, 2006) proposes planning cities through the design of the landscape rather than buildings and infrastructure, imagining new relationships and possibilities among the elements involved, reasoning with horizontal alignments rather than vertical development and introducing an understanding of the dimension of time and the changing nature of environments into the planning process (Corner, 2006). Ecological Urbanism (Mostafavi & Doherty, 2010), stemming from Landscape Urbanism, bends the focus towards envisioning and planning cities not only as cultural constructs but also as artificial ecosystems, to be designed and organized based on their demand and supply of resources (Hagan, 2014).
Within these approaches, the architectural scale is often overlooked among the levels of intervention at which it is possible to make substantial contributions to envisioning biodiverse urban public spaces. Architecture is a critical field in the challenge to make cities more sustainable and biodiverse: the construction sector is responsible directly and indirectly for more than one-third of global energy and process-related CO2 emissions (Aste, Del Pero, & Leonforte, 2022), and buildings play a crucial role in the formation of urban heat islands; furthermore, architectural design holds the potential to shape the built environment and therefore drive or support greening strategies and integrated and sustainable models for urban biodiversity. Several recent innovations in the practice show through prototype buildings the feasibility of integrating trees and greening in architecture, especially in the framework of NBS at the building scale (World Bank, 2021), entailing the construction of new green roofs and green façades on new buildings or existing buildings. Biophilic design, on the other hand, poses humans’ innate connection to nature as the foundation of an approach aiming to incorporate natural elements and references into the built environment to improve physical and mental well-being, enhance productivity, and promote a sense of harmony (Kellert, Heerwagen, & Mador, 2008). However, as far as efficient systems, in most cases, these strategies are not involved in the compositive conceptualization of the building: they represent “applied” solutions that are integrated into the design process at a later stage than other fundamental disciplinary tools of architectural design. A similar issue exists with the framework known as Animal-Aided Design (Hauck & Weisser, 2019) which, despite looking at the urban environment as an integration of scales and dimensions, including architecture, this approach is more oriented towards applied strategies on and around buildings, rather than investigating the effect of their outlining, composition and massing towards biodiversity.
Apart from these innovations, there is a general lack of attention to integrating urban biodiversity targets among the main challenges in the field of architecture. Furthermore, urban greening plans or strategies rarely involve the architectural scale: research developed within Activity 3.1 of NBFC Spoke 5 reveals that urban Green Plans[4] (Pastore & Lazzarini, 2024) in Italy have a scarce commitment to implementation (Lazzarini, Mahmoud, & Pastore, 2024), highlighting, among the rest, a weak ability of planning instruments to engage with the architectural and urban design scale and domain. Given the multidimensional nature of urban challenges, it is crucial to increase knowledge on the possible role of architecture in better integrating design solutions at different scales for more sustainable and biodiverse urban environments. Architectural composition can make a key contribution to the challenge of designing biodiverse urban public spaces by employing disciplinary fundamentals such as morphological study and typological methods: it can integrate ecological and qualitative requirements of urban public spaces, creating the conditions for biodiversity to thrive while ensuring that these spaces are safe, allergy-free, easy to maintain, welcoming, and accessible, suitable for developing high-quality uses and fostering meaningful relationships.
Figure 1. Extract from the Atlas of Urban Regeneration of the Municipality of Milan. The online Atlas map provides an overall and periodically updated view (Credits: Municipality of Milan).
3. Materials and Methods
3.1 Study Design and Setting
The methodology's first step involves choosing a context of study. The NBFC Spoke 5 research units are based in Milan (Politecnico di Milano, Università degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca), Florence (Università degli Studi di Firenze), Rome (Sapienza Università di Roma) Campobasso (Università degli Studi del Molise), and the different locations where Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche – CNR is based. Milan is the spatial context where the majority of Spoke 5 researchers are based, and the city has been chosen as the context of this study due to the potential usefulness of the results to further Milan-based research within Spoke 5. Furthermore, the city of Milan was chosen as it offers a compelling example for studying the role of urban open spaces in medium and large-scale developments, focusing on the existing relationships between biodiversity and different urban morphologies, for a large amount of land developed or re-developed over the past 30 years, which amounts around 10 square kilometres[5]. Milan has undergone multiple large and medium-scale transformations, continuously following one another: a rare occurrence at the Italian national level and a prominent case also at the European level.
At the same time, the city of Milan is characterized by local regulations, such as the Piani di Governo del Territorio (territorial government plans) along with actions resulting from public-private negotiations (PRU - Urban Redevelopment Program, Programma di Riqualificazione Urbana - and PII – Integrated Intervention Program, Programma Integrato di Intervento), which have consistently considered the need to improve public green spaces and parks; initiatives such as “Nine Parks for Milan”[6] (Comune di Milano, Laboratorio di progettazione urbana, 1995) (Marinoni, 2007) and, more recently, “20 Parks for Milan”[7], the strategic policy document “Future Landscapes - Milan: open spaces in a metropolitan vision”[8], the “Public Green Regulations of the Municipality of Milan”[9], “Forestami”[10] project, the “Guidelines for the design of the public space”[11] and many other initiatives demonstrate, together with a vibrant public debate, how urban planning and implementation tools for urban development have strengthened environmental parameters and, at the same time, have oriented public interest towards recognizing the benefits of urban nature and advocating for a more widespread presence of green spaces in the city of Milan. The rapid pace of building activity in Milan has transformed the city’s landscape within a few years. This speed also allows us to observe how, over a short period, the evolution of public discourse about the benefits of urban nature – both in Milan and at the European and global levels – has influenced, or failed to influence, architectural morphologies and settlement layouts.
With the aim of uncovering which urban morphologies are most conducive to creating space and conditions for biodiversity to thrive, as well as providing ecosystem services while ensuring high accessibility and visibility, the research focuses on five case studies of architectural and urban development in Milan conducted in the last three decades, chosen among a broader selection, to investigate how their building morphology influences their interactions between open and built spaces. A quantitative-qualitative analysis is conducted at the urban scale, involving tracing the perimeter of open space in each case study, examining their shape, compactness articulation, and continuity conditions that the perimeter edges can establish with the elements of the adjacent urban fabric. The quantitative investigation includes: 1) the connectivity established within each case with existing or potential ecological corridors and/or green infrastructures at the municipality level; 2) the connectivity established within each case with green areas at the neighbourhood level; 3) the extension of building fronts (intended also as windowed fronts, which allow for overlooking outside) generated by each case within the masterplan; 4) the extension of building fronts from the existing urban fabric with which each case establish connectivity; 5) the “compactness” of each open space. Qualitative remarks are then expressed to supplement the quantitative findings.
Figure 2. Planimetric extract of the 15 urban-scale interventions detailed for this study. The park area is highlighted in red on the aerial photo. The projects, listed vertically from top left, are: Merezzate, Figino Borgo Sostenibile, Ex Macello, Ex Trotto, City Life, Cascina Merlata, Ex Scalo Porta Romana, Ex Scalo Farini, Porta Nuova, Ex OM, Adriano, Palizzi, Santa Giulia, Ex Calchi Taeggi, Ex Piazza d'Armi. (Aerial photos: Google Earth; edited by the authors with Michele Porcelluzzi).
3.2 Materials
Five case studies carried out in the last three decades were selected from the Atlas of Urban Regeneration of the Municipality of Milan (Figure 1). Among the regeneration areas listed in the Atlas, the selection criteria excluded transformation areas under 10.000 sqm, those under construction, those that did not involve an increase in the volume of residential use, those that did not provide substantial associated open spaces, and those presenting non-recurring morphologies deemed irrelevant for building a thesis due to their infrequency. The results of this initial selection identified 15 regeneration areas (Figure 2), from which 10 were excluded due to their unique characteristics (such as the presence of heavy infrastructure, the presence of a water body, the recreation of historical layouts), making them less comparable to the others. Consequently, five case studies were selected as they presented comparable spatial conditions. The five selected case studies are the districts named PII Santa Giulia, PII Cascina Merlata, PII CityLife, PII Garibaldi-Repubblica, PII Calchi Taeggi e Bisceglie. With the exception of Cascina Merlata, which was built on former agricultural land, the cases studied have in common that they are developed on land previously occupied by other functions, often called brownfields. These include former industrial areas released by relocations, as seen in the cases of Santa Giulia and Calchi Taeggi; former urban macro-functions, as in the case of City Life, which replaces the old pavilions of the Milan Trade Fair; and urban voids created by the transformation of the railway system, as in the case of Garibaldi-Repubblica. This means that, in most cases, the start of the transformation is preceded by land reclamation from polluting sources. In examining their location in relation to the more consolidated parts of the city, the selection includes areas located in densely built-up central areas, immediately adjacent to the consolidated city, and more rarefied peripheral contexts, as seen in the other three cases.
3.3 Procedures and Data Analysis
The cases were examined using publicly available project documents, orthophotos, and direct observations during visits. The perimeter of the open space in each area was traced using AutoCAD software (Figure 5). The Municipal Ecological Network map[12] of Comune di Milano (Figure 3) was superimposed onto each area to evaluate the compliance with existing or potential ecological corridors and the openings' width (Figure 6). Connectivity towards four elements (existing or potential ecological corridors and/or green infrastructures at the municipality level, green areas at the neighbourhood level, building fronts within the masterplan, and building fronts from the existing urban fabric) was visually represented in schemes using different lines and symbols, to aid in visualizing the conditions of each perimeter (Figure 7).
Figure 3. Extract of the ‘Municipal Ecological Network and Urban Green and Open Space System’ map. Territorial Governance Plan of Milan. (Map: Comune di Milano).
A “compactness” index was calculated by relating the perimeter and area to understand the relationship between the compactness of the open space outlines and their ability to provide a higher ratio of ecological connectivity and citizens’ accessibility as well as views from the architectural objects part of the same masterplan and those part of the existing urban fabric.
Perimeters and their connectivity conditions were compared visually to assess which case offered better conditions for the conservation and implementation of urban biodiversity. The results of this comparison were then coupled with the qualitative characteristics of such spaces and the potential biodiversity conditions they may create, providing an opportunity to reflect on the possible interconnection between ecological connectivity and citizens’ accessibility and views. The diagrams (Figure 7) enable the interpretation of contexts, and their abstract nature makes them suitable for transferring the methodology and the emerging topic to other case studies. The study does not explicitly consider variables such as management, choice of plant species, or maintenance, nor does it measure actual biodiversity. The considerations primarily focus on spatial configuration.
Figure 4. Methodology of the Research.
Figure 5. Extract from the analysis files of the five sample projects selected as representative of the most common morphologies. Drawings by the authors with Michele Porcelluzzi. (Map: Comune di Milano. Aerial photographs: Google Earth).
Figure 6. Extract from the analysis files of the five in-depth case studies, superimposed on the map ‘Municipal Ecological Network and Urban Green and Open Space System’ of the Municipality of Milan, to assess consistency with existing or potential green infrastructure. (Aerial photos: Google Earth; map: Comune di Milano; edited by the authors).
4. Results
4.1 Presentation of Key Findings
The results of this investigation allow us to answer the initial research question preliminarily: it is possible to outline some correlations between urban morphology, potential biodiversity, and the level of accessibility and visibility of green spaces. These correlations concern, at the urban scale, some characteristics that may be crucial in defining the biodiverse potential of a given settlement form: (1) the variation in the compactness[13] of the green surface and/or its articulation, and (2) the continuity conditions that the perimeter edges can establish with the elements of the adjacent urban fabric. During the study, important considerations emerged at the scale of the built plot: (3) the degree of permeability of the building front adjacent to the perimeter and, consequently, the possibility of ecological exchanges to and from the areas pertaining to the plots. The analysis of these characteristics with respect to the cases under study led to the identification of three recurring morphologies, which present different characteristics capable of generating different conditions for the potential development of urban biodiversity in terms of accessibility and visibility: the “Central Park”, the “Fluid Park”, and the “Garden Between Houses”. The study was limited to the Milanese context and a time range identified within the last 30 years.
5. Discussion
5.1 Interpretation of Key Findings
The results obtained from this study have enabled the development of an interpretative framework aimed at substantiating the initial hypothesis, namely the existence of a relationship between urban form and biodiversity. This framework also preliminarily defines an analysis method to evaluate a given settlement's biodiversity potential. The following paragraphs, therefore, present a series of considerations with potential implications for design practice, exploring the geometric reasons that make some settlement forms more predisposed to foster the development of organic components, enhance biodiversity, provide ecosystem services, and define highly accessible and visible urban public spaces. The main distinguishing aspects will be highlighted, initially at the urban scale and subsequently at the scale of each single plot. The analysis method developed has been applied to the urban transformations of the Milanese territory, although it is believed that it can be generalized. This has allowed the identification of some recurring morphological settings that respond to different quantitative and qualitative relationships between green spaces and built parts. The ability to recognize these different geometric settings has enabled us to reflect on the diverse potential that each morphology possesses in favouring (or hindering) the construction of a biodiverse urban environment and equitable access to the latter – inspired by parameters such as the 3-30-300 rule[14] (Konijnendijk, 2021). Considering that this represents the inaugural step in a newly initiated and developing research line, some limitations and directions for future development are outlined.
5.1.1 Compactness / Articulation: Three Morphological Categories
Starting the morphological analysis at the urban scale, the first discriminator that allows categorisation is related to the degree of compactness (or articulation) assumed by the open green areas in relation to the built environment. A compactness index, resulting from the geometric ratio between the perimeter of the green area and the area itself, can give indication of the biodiversity potential of a given urban form, e.g. it quantifies the amount of green front per unit area. The increasing value of this ratio describes the transition from a more compact geometry to a more articulated one, approximating the ability of a given shape to generate areas of exchange with the peripheral built spaces, whether existing or planned. This first phase of the study, limited to the Milanese context and to a specific time period, identified three main categories that, although arising from the specific context of the study, exhibit a certain degree of generalisation: the “Central Park”, the “Fluid Park”, and the “Garden Between Houses”. These three morphological categories present different compactness and connectivity levels to different elements and urban environments, potentially creating the spatial conditions for the development of urban biodiversity.
Figure 7. Example of graphical results of the proposed analysis method. The perimeter of the open space is drawn with different graphic symbols to highlight the connectivity with the different elements and the tangency with the different urban environments. (Drawings by the authors with Michele Porcelluzzi).
The “Central Park” features settlement forms that clearly distinguish between the areas allocated to the public park and built lots (mainly residential). In this case, the large green space presents a compact geometry characterized by a low perimeter-to-area ratio. In the most representative cases, the use of a regular form prevails, aspiring to define a recognisable and identity-bearing geometry. Among the characteristics of this settlement form, the reduced perimeter relative to the green surface tends to concentrate and limit contact points with the built environment (newly constructed or belonging to the existing urban fabric) and territorial systems. Additionally, greater geometric compactness correlates with an increased average depth separating from the edge to the park’s centre, creating conditions favourable to biodiversity – for example, reducing light or noise pollution in the park’s core. For this same reason, however, green areas farther from inhabited zones are less frequented at night, which can lead to safety concerns. Examples in this category include the completed interventions of Garibaldi-Repubblica and Calchi Taeggi and the park planned by the Santa Giulia district masterplan, partially realised today.
Like the previous category, the “Fluid Park” refers to settlement forms that define a clear distinction between the areas allocated to the public park and built lots. Unlike the previous case, the “Fluid Park” presents a complex, articulated geometry, resulting in a long perimeter in relation to the enclosed area. In the most representative cases, the perimeter presents a complex and branched geometry that tends to maximize contact points with the surrounding built environment and territorial systems, facilitating the reconnection of natural elements. Compared to the “Central Park” model, this condition can offer more benefits for ecological connectivity at both the neighbourhood and metropolitan scales and greater accessibility and visibility between the park and the built volumes. Examples of this category include the City Life and Cascina Merlata interventions.
A third category emerged from the initial selection of case studies. Even if it was not analysed in detail in the five case studies, it emerged as relevant and will require future investigation. Unlike the previous categories, the “Garden Between Houses” refers to settlement forms that do not clearly distinguish between areas allocated to the park and the built lots. This approach does not introduce a large, autonomous park separate from the built lots, but promotes a more homogeneous and integrated distribution between green spaces and built volumes. In contrast to the previous cases, where there was a concentration of overall volumes in densely built lots with limited spaces for nature, this third category involves a more horizontal distribution of building density and green spaces. With equal overall volumes, the built environment can be developed on a smaller scale, with open spaces more closely resembling a neighbourhood garden: an articulated network of houses and gardens for local use rather than an urban park. This morphological category allows for small-scale green development, which does not necessarily enhance ecological connectivity on a metropolitan scale but can generate local or neighbourhood-scale biodiversity or the possibility to experience biodiversity in domestic outdoor spaces (Uwajeh & Ezennia, 2018), supported by various private frontages (Beumer & Martens, 2015). Integrating green spaces with inhabited areas results in high accessibility, visibility, and safety — both real and perceived – and can benefit from informal surveillance by residents. Examples include the interventions in Figino, Merezzate, and Crescenzago.
5.1.2 Continuity Conditions along the Edge
The proposed analysis method includes a qualitative examination of how the edges along the perimeter of green surfaces are designed. Characterising these edges allows for the description, through quantitative data (percentage of perimeter length) and qualitative planimetric diagrams, of the capacity generated by a given settlement form to interact with (1) primary elements of ecosystem continuity, such as existing ecological corridors and/or green infrastructures at the municipality level, environmental networks, and biodiversity nodes; (2) secondary elements, such as roadside trees or arboreal areas covering parking spaces and green areas at the neighbourhood level; (3) building fronts belonging to the same settlement system or referring to the surrounding urban fabric. The greater a settlement form’s ability to introduce continuity conditions along green surface edges, generate or strengthen ecosystem networks, and interact with the built environment, the greater its biodiversity potential.
5.1.3 Permeability of Built Fronts
A second complementary analysis must be introduced to complete these initial considerations, focusing on the internal morphology of individual built lots. This internal morphology can vary independently of the overall settlement scheme and the geometry assigned to the green surface, impacting ecosystem continuity along the edge. The settlement forms adopted within the lots are clearly influenced by the quality of frontages and the potential relationships the built environment can establish with the surrounding context. Different morphological choices can thus exploit these opportunities to varying degrees, either limiting or multiplying them. The distribution of volumes can propose either closed geometries, defining discontinuous and introverted courtyards, or permeable geometries, where the heart of the lots is in continuity with the surrounding open space system. In these cases, the biodiversity potential varies depending on a series of interrelated geometric factors impacting the quality of open space between buildings. Designing a permeable building front, for example, involves repositioning volumes to free up the plot’s edge. In purely geometric terms, these volumes can find new placement by increasing in height or occupying internal open spaces within the plot. These choices impact aspects such as the presence of trees or shrubs (whether in open ground, planters, or pots) within the lot's depth, as well as the shading and usability conditions of the open spaces themselves. The analysis at this scale was implemented using a taxonomic approach, extracting from the selected urban transformations a number of samples able to represent the most recurring typical conditions.
5.2 Limitations and Implications and Future Directions
As stated, the study does not explicitly consider variables such as management, choice of plant species, or maintenance, nor does it measure biodiversity in any of the cases. The considerations primarily focus on spatial configuration. In this initial study phase, some possible additional morphological categories were excluded, such as modernist open-plan estates. Over the past 30 years, the international trend in Milan, as well as much of the continent, has followed settlement schemes proposing the idea of the îlot ouvert (Lucan, 2012), based on a clear identification of buildable lots, generally for private use, interspersed with networks of roadways and public spaces. Open-plan systems, characterised by single buildings distributed over entirely public, often predominantly green, land crossed by pedestrian and vehicular paths, refer to an earlier era of development recurring in Milan within Public Residential Housing contexts. Expanding the initial sample, both geographically and temporally, could, therefore, subsequently reveal additional categories. Future developments of this study, therefore, involve applying to the methodology to other architectural and urban typologies to assess their conduciveness to urban biodiversity.
6. Conclusion
In conclusion, based on the case study analysis and the results that emerged, this research suggests that within the context of large urban transformations involving changes in settlement layouts and new developments adjacent to established urban fabrics, there are no single morphologies definitely more suitable than others for conserving, promoting and implementing urban biodiversity while maintaining accessibility and visibility for citizens. Instead, different morphologies create different conditions that are potentially more favourable to specific objectives. This answers the research question and confirms the initial hypothesis about the possibility of identifying a morphological definition of urban open spaces that can foster the development of organic components, enhance biodiversity, provide ecosystem services, and define highly accessible and visible urban public spaces.
The study unveils how certain morphologies, with specific conditions, can be more suitable for conserving, promoting, and implementing urban biodiversity in specific spatial conditions within the surrounding urban fabric. Although it requires further study, this result is significant on several levels: it provides a possible decision-making tool for architects and urban designers for planning urban spaces to support green infrastructure networks. It also allows the examination of different design options to understand which can increase urban biodiversity, both in support of green infrastructure and as a qualitative factor in building development. This can have implications for quality of life by considering the accessibility and visibility of green spaces in new buildings or in urban and environmental regeneration actions.
Due to the complexity and diversity of variables in the analysed case study, the research scope was limited to analysing open space morphology at the urban scale, deferring an in-depth study at the building plot level to future studies. Another aspect not investigated concerns those factors interacting with morphology in determining the effective conservation, promotion and implementation of urban biodiversity, such as the choice of plant species, the positioning of species, maintenance, and user behaviour in the open spaces, among others. Furthermore, within this study, biodiversity is not measured but rather considered in the spatial characteristics that affect its development.
Another perspective of this research involves identifying issues related to the green transition of urban public spaces from an interdisciplinary perspective. This aims to identify interaction points among different areas of expertise. Future perspectives include transferring and verifying this method to other architectural and urban typologies to assess their conduciveness to urban biodiversity and in contexts other than Milan. This will help examine potential variables related to changes in the scale of the investigation context and/or different planning layouts. It will also verify the method in built environments characterized by settlement schemes from different historical periods, opening up further studies on the possibilities of intervention in the built environment by introducing or intensifying green landscapes. These perspectives contribute to refining and solidifying the methodology, making it not only an analytical tool but also a predictive one.
Figure 8. Morphological analyses of a sample of representative built plots extracted from the case studies to interpret the permeability of the built fronts. (Drawings by the authors with Michele Porcelluzzi).
Implications of the Findings
This study and its potential developments highlight the largely unexplored yet crucial role that architectural and urban composition, particularly morphological definition, can play in conserving, promoting, and implementing urban biodiversity while ensuring accessible public spaces. By identifying the correlation between urban morphology and biodiversity potential, this research contributes to the field of architectural and urban design and urban studies by shedding light on the role that architectural composition and urban design – and, therefore, architects and urban designers - can play in the emerging challenge of designing urban spaces aimed at conserving and enhancing urban biodiversity and facilitating ecosystem services provision.
Acknowledgements
Ph.D. Candidate MSc Michele Porcelluzzi (Department of Architecture and Urban Studies, Politecnico di Milano) has participated in the initial stages of the study, performing documental research and elaborating preliminary versions of figures.
Funding
This research is conducted in the framework of the project NBFC, National Biodiversity Future Center, Palermo 90133, Italy. NBFC is a project funded under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP), Mission 4 Component 2 Investment 1.4 - Call for tender No. 3138 of 16 December 2021, rectified by Decree n.3175 of 18 December 2021 of the Italian Ministry of University and Research funded by the European Union – NextGenerationEU. Project code CN_00000033, Concession Decree No. 1034 of 17 June 2022 adopted by the Italian Ministry of University and Research, CUP, D43C22001250001, Project title “National Biodiversity Future Center - NBFC”.
Conflicts of Interest
The authors declare no conflicts of interest.
Data availability statement
The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article. Further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author.
Institutional Review Board Statement
Not applicable.
Credit author statement:
F.L. and F.Z. share first authorship rights; the order is purely alphabetical. Conceptualization and methodology: F.L. and F.Z. Writing: Part 1, 6: F.L. and F.Z. Part 2, 3: F.Z. Part 4, 5: F.L. The figures, unless otherwise indicated, are elaborated by the authors. Both authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.
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