Integrating green infrastructure into spatial planning regulations to improve the performance of urban ecosystems. Insights from an Italian case study

Traditional land-use planning models have been unable to completely address environmental protection concerns without taking into account the suitability of the land to host a specific function or its consistency within a wider territorial context. Nowadays, new Planning approaches tend to a new paradigm considering a qualitative dimension of the public city based on performance standards considering the possible provision of multiple benefits in terms of regulating, supporting, provisioning and cultural services. The paper provides the results of an experience conducted in the municipality of Rescaldina, located in the northern part of the Milan Metropolitan area, where traditional quantitative standards were overpass towards a performance standards approach based on Ecosystem Services (ES) provision. ES provision via spatial planning has been advocated through Green infrastructure (GI) while NBS are considered as the greening design actions that can contribute to developing GI. The areas (public and private) included in the GI have a specific planning regulation for its implementation and its operability. The GI strategy was defined in the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) as a support tool for setting Planning strategies.