南京城市土壤重金属含量及其影响因素

研究了南京城市土壤重金属含量、来源及其与土壤性质的关系。结果表明,南京城市土壤中,Fe、Ni、Co、V污染不明显,但受到了不同程度的Mn、Cr、Cu、Zn、Pb污染,其中：Pb污染非常严重;重金属在土壤剖面分布没有规律性;Fe、Ni、Co、V元素主要来源于原土壤物质,Cu、Zn、Pb、Cr元素主要来源于人为输入,Mn可能在不同的土壤中来源不同;Fe、Cr、Ni、Co、V元素含量之间均呈极显著正相关,Cu、Zn、Pb、Cr元素含量之间均呈极显著正相关。Fe、Co、V、Ni含量与粘粒含量、CEC呈极显著正相关;Cu、Zn、Pb含量与粘粒含量呈极显著负相关;Cu、Zn、Pb、Cr含量与有机碳呈极显著正相关,Pb含量与pH呈极显著正相关。     

沈阳城市森林主要绿化树种——丁香的光合特性研究

应用LI-6400红外气体分析仪对城市森林典型树种丁香不同季节光合作用的日变化规律进行研究,采用相关分析和多元逐步回归统计分析方法,得出净光合速率与光合有效辐射、气温、大气湿度、气孔导度等生理生态因子间的相关关系．结果表明,丁香春季和夏季光合速率呈双峰曲线,秋季呈单峰曲线．春季影响光合速率的主要因子为光合有效辐射和气孔导度;夏季影响光合速率的主要因子为气孔导度和光合有效辐射;秋季为气孔导度和胞间CO2浓度,建立了相应的影响因子回归方程。     

Inner city stormwater control using a combination of best management practices

Structural best management practices (BMPs) are now commonplace for stormwater management in new suburban developments; however, their installation in older central areas is limited. Here, the effect of disconnecting impervious areas from a combined sewer in favour of a new open stormwater system is investigated. The site, an inner city suburb of Malmö, Sweden, consists of council offices and apartment blocks separated by courtyards, roads and parking places. The BMPs range from green-roofs and open channels to detention ponds and their choice, size and location was dictated by cost, available land, safety and public expectations. The system was assessed by comparing synthetic hydrographs for the 1/2, 2, 5 and 10-year design-storms assuming wet and dry initial conditions. Direct runoff was simulated using the time–area method; and routing through the BMPs using PondPack. As the BMPs are in series, the outflow of one BMP became part of the inflow to the next in the system. Additionally, the water balance for the year 2001–2002 was investigated. It was found that the green-roofs are effective at lowering the total runoff from Augustenborg and that the ponds should successfully attenuate storm peak flows for even the 10-year rainfall.     

Geochemical baseline determination and pollution assessment of heavy metals in urban soils of Karachi,Pakistan

Karachi is one of the most populated urban agglomerations in the world. No categorical study has yet discussed the geochemical baseline concentrations of metals in the urban soil of Karachi. The main objectives of this study were to establish geochemical baseline values and to assess the pollution status of different heavy metals. Geochemical baseline concentrations of heavy metals were estimated using the cumulative frequency distribution (CDF) curves. The estimated baseline concentrations of Pb, Cr, Cu, Zn and Fe were 56.23, 12.9, 36.31, 123.03 and 11,776 mg kg⁻¹, respectively. The pollution status of heavy metals in urban soils was evaluated using different quantitative indices (enrichment factor–EF, Geo-accumulation Index–I_geo, and pollution index–PI). Enrichments factors of the selected heavy metals determined by using Fe as a normalizer showed that metal contamination was the product of anthropogenic activities. The urban soils of Karachi were found to have a moderate to moderately severe enrichment with Pb, whereas Cr and Cu has moderate and Zn has minor enrichment. I_geo results indicated moderate soil contamination by Pb at some of the sampling locations. PI for Pb, Cr, Cu and Zn was found in the range of 0.04–3.42, 0.19–1.55, 0.27–2.45 and 0.32–1.57, respectively. Large variations in PI values of Pb revealed that soil in those areas of the city which are influenced by intensive anthropogenic activities have exceptionally high concentrations of Pb. The findings of this study would contribute to the environmental database of the soil of the region and would also facilitate both at the local and the international scales, in a more accurate global environmental monitoring, which will eventually facilitate the development of management and remediation strategies for heavy metal contaminated urban soil.     

Fears,attitudes and opinions of suburban residents with regards to their urban foxes

Throughout Central Europe, foxes have taken over urban areas as their habitat. In Southern Germany, these foxes are also carriers of the small fox tapeworm, which causes a serious zoonotic infection in humans. Therefore, a survey was carried out in a suburb of the city of Munich. A postal questionnaire was used to analyse the attitudes, opinions and fears of these participants towards their urban foxes and the background to these attitudes. Questionnaires were sent to all households with gardens and collected in again via the community council. Seven hundred and seventy-nine or 31% of questionnaires were returned. Only a few people are afraid of the fox itself; however, 55% are afraid of the fox tapeworm. Worming the animals is the preferred counter-measure, with 81% in favour. The majority of inhabitants are pleased to see a fox in the community and feel the animals have a right to live. People are afraid of the tapeworm either because they have children in the household or because of increased knowledge of the subject or because it has increasingly become an issue. On the basis of the results of this study, it is to be expected that radical solutions such as killing the foxes are unlikely to be accepted among the population. Worming of the foxes does, however, meet with general approval.     

Advancing understanding of the complex nature of urban systems

Cities and urbanized regions are complex, dynamic, and highly integrated systems linking social, ecological, and technical infrastructure domains in ways that create deep challenges for good governance, policymaking, and planning. The combination of impacts from climate change in cities, air pollution, rapid population growth, multiple sources of development pressure and overall urban system complexity make it difficult for decision-makers to develop and guide development trajectories along more livable, equitable, and at the same time, more resilient pathways. Advancing urban sustainability and resilience agendas requires expanding the scope of inter- and trans-disciplinarity approaches, moving beyond the historically separate social–ecological and socio-technical approaches to jointly study social–ecological–technical infrastructure systems in cities. We take urban complexity as a given and suggest that in both research and practice we need to better capture and understand feedbacks, interdependencies, and non-linearities which create uncertainties and challenge the efficacy of governance practices to achieve normative goals for society. Here, we explore new methods, tools, and approaches to advance our understanding of urban system complexity through a series of journal special issue articles that examine urban structure–function relationships, urban sustainability transitions, green space availability, social–ecological memory, functional traits, and urban land use scenarios.     

Woody trees,green space and park size improve avian biodiversity in urban landscapes of Peninsular Malaysia

Rapid urbanization in major cities has adversely affected avian biodiversity in both developed and developing countries. Due to over-urbanization and little regard for nature conservation, such cities are usually characterized by poor biodiversity. In contrast to central business district areas, suburbs may support greater levels of biodiversity through an increase in green areas. We examined urban bird species richness, abundance, and composition in Klang Valley, Peninsular Malaysia. We surveyed 141 points for passerines across 80 parks grouped into two different urban zones, namely central business districts and suburbs. Our results revealed that bird richness did not differ significantly (p = 0.994) between central business districts and the suburbs. We found that the abundances of birds were significantly greater in the suburbs than in central business districts. However, species composition was similar between the central business districts and suburbs. We also found that bird richness increased significantly with an increase in size of green areas and park areas, as well as the number of woody trees in both zones. Evidence from this study suggests that creating urban parks and gardens, coupled with tree planting in central business districts, is able to support greater biodiversity, at least for birds in cities similar to those found in the suburbs.     

Evaluation method for coalmining-based cities ecosystem based on attribute mathematical model with Huainan City as an example

Attributive recognition model of coalmining-based cities ecosystem classification is developed in terms of attributive mathematical theory. Based on the analysis of main causes of coalmining-based cities ecosystem, the city vitality, city structure strength, city resilience ability, service functions and health status are chosen as the criterion indicators of coalmining-based cities ecosystem classification; the attributive measurement functions are constructed to compute the attributive measurement of single indicator and multi-indicator; and the synthetic attributive measurement is calculated by the AHP; the health classification of cities ecosystem are recognized by the confidence criterion. An empirical analysis is made by the proposed model and method, the synthetic evaluation results are better than fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method which validates the proposed model feasible, effective and reliable in coalmining-based cities ecosystem classification. As attributive recognition theory can success fully resolve certain issues with a number of fuzzy attribution in comprehensive evaluation, its confidence criterion is established on the basis of the ordered evaluation sets, consequently it will make the evaluation results more reliable.     

Quantifying the relationship between urban development intensity and carbon dioxide emissions using a panel data analysis

As a factor associated with urban management and planning, urban development intensity (UDI) could in fact form the basis for a new rationale in coordinating urban sustainable development and reducing CO₂ emissions. However, existing literature engaging in the task of quantifying the impacts of urban development intensity on CO₂ emissions is limited. Therefore, the goal of this study is to quantify the relationship between urban development intensity and CO₂ emissions for a panel made up of the five major cities in China (Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Chongqing and Guangzhou) using time series data from 1995 to 2011. Firstly, this study calculated CO₂ emissions for the five selected cities and presented a comprehensive index system for the assessment of the level of urban development intensity based on six aspects (land-use intensity, economic intensity, population intensity, infrastructure intensity, public service intensity and eco-environmental intensity) using locally important socioeconomic variables. Panel data analysis was subsequently utilised in order to quantify the relationships between urban development intensity and CO₂ emissions. The empirical results of the study indicate that factors such as land-use intensity, economic intensity, population intensity, infrastructure intensity and public service intensity exert a positive influence on CO₂ emissions. Further, the estimated coefficients suggest that land-use intensity is the most important factor in relation to CO₂ emissions. Conversely, eco-environmental intensity was identified as having a major inhibitory effect on CO₂ emission levels. The findings of this study hold important implications for both academics and practitioners, indicating that, on the path towards developing low-carbon cities in China, the effects of urban development intensity must be taken into consideration.