Implications of the COVID-19 Pandemic for Future Urban and Spatial Planning

Dear Colleagues,

The recent pandemic that has been affecting the entire global community has already altered several dimensions of our urban life. Even if spatial planning has not been considered among the most critical spheres during the COVID-19 emergency, urban planners should become key players for guiding the future of our cities, by redefining old practices and assumptions, capitalizing innovative approaches developed during the emergency by stabilizing them in the long term, and proposing innovative methods and tools.

This Special Issue intends to investigate several dimensions of urban and spatial planning and policies that could be significantly affected by a concrete change following the outbreak.

One pressing question that should be reconsidered is the tensions between densification and the spreading of cities. Dense cities are widely considered as more energy and transport efficient, but intensification could undermine the cities’ livability and resilience by reducing the presence of green areas and urban ecosystems and increasing traffic congestion and overcrowding. Following the lockdown, the search for more public space to respect social distancing measures and also the increased acknowledgment of the importance of living near green areas by the people suffering from different degrees of lockdown have emphasized the need to find a balance between the competing demands of green spaces and compact cities. The question for the future is therefore how to assess and ensure the limit of density by balancing compactness and ecosystem services benefits. This means to rethink new forms of urban ecosystems and the related supply and demand flows within the city and to reconsider urban and close rural contexts and their mutual relationships.

Social distancing and the health measures imposed by the COVID-19 emergency have also been changing the way people use public spaces and services within the city, their workplace, and housing spaces in terms of sizes needed and performance, with underlying old and persistent shortcomings and the necessity of structural changes. Healthcare, education, public transport, and the organization of work are the spheres of urban life that have been mostly affected by the pandemic and should be reshaped and redefined according to the post-pandemic situation. Particular attention should be dedicated to urban mobility and how to make this COVID-19 recovery phase a game-changer for planning, implementing, and financing more sustainable urban transport systems and solutions, instead of returning to and amplifying the old habits of using individual, motorized transport solutions that pollute and congest urban spaces.

Another potential impact of coronavirus may be an intensification of the digitalization in cities and rural areas, boosting the exploitation of big data and digital infrastructures not only to better control and organize urban systems and services but also to monitor people’s habits and data. The challenge is to define what is worth capitalizing to better support public authorities in data-driven planning and to overcome the digital divide affecting rural and remote areas, vulnerable groups (such as older adults and migrants), etc.

The territorial unbalance that frequently characterizes cities and their peri-urban and rural contexts in terms of land use, ecosystem services, resources, and economic chains, such as food and tourism, has progressively changed, generating new impulses of cooperation between rural and urban stakeholders. The newly found interest for rural settings, made possible by the boost in remote working capabilities, could lead to a possible migration from urban to peri-urban and rural areas that offer cheaper properties and higher environmental quality. This process should also be further explored by considering the conditions that allow such a transition (e.g., access to basic services in rural areas such as health and education) and supporting decision-making processes in local planning to avoid possible future gentrification issues.

Research and review articles are therefore invited for submission to this Special Issue to contribute to and highlight the future of our cities and rural areas after the COVID-19 outbreak.

Prof. Dr. Simona Tondelli
Dr. Elisa Conticelli
Guest Editors

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• post-COVID-19 planning
• urban densification
• urban–rural linkages
• public spaces and services
• digitalization