Towards Healthier Cities - Urban Green Spaces (UGS) in the Neighbourhood - Benfica, Lisbon

Abstract

The World Health Organization and the European Healthy Cities Network recommend that urban planning and design focus on communities and enhance their well-being. In recent years, urban planning and design have provided urban redevelopment in formerly peripheral or crossborder areas. It has offered the opportunity to redesign the public sphere toward sustainable and healthier cities. Benfica is a District of Lisbon in Portugal, which evolved from an overlap of a rural village and a suburbanisation process led by a railway line. It has its character, excellent urban livelihood, and high centrality potential. Benfica is a whole area of green spaces: old rural areas such as Quinta da Granja, urban pockets, the Monsanto Forest Park, and the heritage rehabilitation that allowed the Baldaya Palace gardens to be opened to the public. The study explores the role and impact of proximity green spaces in healthier cities through a mixed methodology, applied to the Green Capital of Lisbon 2020 and Benfica, which is seen as a representative neighbourhood (1) Literature review, policies, urban planning, (2) observation methods, mapping, and spatial analysis of types of green spaces and their correlation with different parameters.