The Utilization of Normalized Difference Vegetation Index to Map Habitat Quality in Turin (Italy)

Stefano Salata, Carolina Giaimo, Carlo Alberto Barbieri, Andrea Ballocca, Francesco Scalise and Giulio Pantaloni
Additional contact information
Stefano Salata: Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning, Responsible Risk Resilience Centre, Politecnico di Torino, 10125 Torino, Italy
Carolina Giaimo: Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning, Politecnico di Torino, 10125 Torino, Italy
Carlo Alberto Barbieri: Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning, Politecnico di Torino, 10125 Torino, Italy
Andrea Ballocca: Consorzio per il Sistema Informativo-CSI Piemonte, Corso Unione Sovietica 216, 10134 Torino, Italy
Francesco Scalise: Consorzio per il Sistema Informativo-CSI Piemonte, Corso Unione Sovietica 216, 10134 Torino, Italy
Giulio Pantaloni: Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning, Politecnico di Torino, 10125 Torino, Italy

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 18, 1-17

Abstract: The integration of ecosystem service mapping in decision-making is crucial to place effective urban design and sustainable planning solutions. Nonetheless, often ecosystem service maps are the product of different data inputs that influences the final modeling output thus affecting final decisions, especially when a finer and site-specific assessment is required to design practical and effective solutions. In this work, the city of Turin (Northwest Italy) was selected as a test site for an empirical experiment of ecosystem service mapping using the software Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs (InVEST): two habitat quality models of the city were compared in a Geographic Information System environment, the first using the “traditional” sensitivity employed during the LIFE SAM4CP European research while the second using the natural difference vegetation index to re-assign the sensitivity scores. Results demonstrate that the integration of site-specific information in the habitat quality input model generates a different result, which is capable of differentiating all those dense built-up areas of the dense settlement system that provide ecosystem supporting functions at the city-level. These differences were analyzed to define new green hotspots in the compact city while furnishing a new perspective for sustainable city planning.

Keywords: ecosystem services; land-use planning; green areas; modeling; remote sensing (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/18/7751/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/18/7751/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:12:y:2020:i:18:p:7751-:d:416047

Access Statistics for this article

Sustainability is currently edited by Ms. Alexandra Wu

More articles in Sustainability from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().