Visibility and accessibility of urban green, urban blue and urban grey in the city region of Cologne with regard to health-promoting urban development and environmental justice
Anna-Maria Bolte Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms Universität Bonn
Supervisors: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Theo Kötter, Prof. Dr. med. Thomas Kistemann
Climate change, socio-demographic change, and an increasing urban population have increased the pressure on inner urban areas and have led to the necessity of a sustainable urban development worldwide. The preservation and qualification of urban green and urban blue spaces plays a key role in this process.
Visibility analysis of green and blue spaces is essential for the design, the planning, the quantification, qualification, and the visualization of multifunctional urban open spaces. It enables the investigation of the indirect access (three-dimensional visibility) of green and blue spaces and its impact on urban dwellers in addition to the direct access (two-dimensional accessibility) of these spaces. The visibility analysis of urban open spaces detects a possible visual connection of green and blue spaces from the perspective of an urban dweller. Urban green and urban blue spaces can be viewed as surfaces (e.g. lawns, rivers) or as points (e.g. trees, bushes). In this case, the building level or the street level are two appropriate points of view to consider the visibility of these elements for the dweller.
The aim of this project is the development of a visibility index to measure and to assess the visibility potential of existing and planned urban open spaces regarding spatial configuration and location within the urban structure and its relevance for individual quality of life. In this way, not only spatial but also content-related characteristics and benefits of open space visibility for the individual dweller can be strategically implemented within urban planning. This also aims to facilitate an interdisciplinary exchange between various stakeholders in urban development.
Bolte, A.; Kötter, T.; Schuppe, S. (2019): Can you see green or blue? On the necessity of visibility analysis of urban open spaces using Remote Sensing techniques and Geographic Information Systems, 2019 Joint Urban Remote Sensing Event (JURSE), Vannes, France, 2019, pp. 1-4. doi: 10.1109/JURSE.2019.8808936
