The Earth has entered the Anthropocene—an epoch in which human activities have become the dominant force shaping planetary systems. Anthropogenic actions such as deforestation, overexploitation and rapid urban expansion have significantly accelerated global climate change. The consequences of this transformation, including more frequent extreme climate events and environmental degradation, have had profound negative impacts on human life and livelihoods. Moreover, environmental issues have exacerbated broader social challenges, which intertwined with ecological crises, leading to reduced social stability and diminished adaptive capacity.
As one of the most ecologically resilient terrestrial ecosystems, forests have played a vital role in Europe's sustainable development strategies. Moreover, forests serve as cultural and economic landscapes, historically embedded in traditional livelihoods and social practices. As such, increasing attention has been directed toward integrating reforestation strategies with socio-environmental adaptation goals, using landscape interventions to enhance territorial resilience and sustainability.
Post-industrial regions, characterized by environmental degradation and economic decline, exemplify spaces where socio-environmental challenges are most acute. This paper focuses on how forest-based ecosystem services can be mobilized to recast such landscapes. Using the former mining basin of Nord-Pas-de-Calais in northern France as a case study, the research explores how forests can be reinterpreted, planned, and developed as strategic instruments for post-industrial territorial transformation.

The agricultural plains of Thessaly in Greece have been historically sensitive to flooding. These floods result in extreme socio-economic, spatial and environmental consequences, whose severity is heavily impacted by human actions manipulating the natural ecosystems of the region. Specifically, the extensive urbanization of Thessaly’s agricultural landscape – one of the main productive agricultural cores of Greece – combined with the anthropogenic alteration of the hydrological system to address the region’s water scarcity problem, are leading towards the appropriation and exhaustion of the water ecosystem. This has contributed to the extent of the negative consequences in extreme cases of flooding, such as this of September 2023, and to the system’s inability to cope, recover and adapt to these events. Therefore, there is an imperative need for the reconfiguration of the existing water and land management framework through transformative actions grounded on ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) and nature-based solutions (NBS), in order to enhance the system’s adaptive capacity to flooding. An area near the Karla Reservoir is used as a case study. The proposed transformations both inform and are informed by local practices, and are supported by land policies, aiming to create an integrated framework for environmental co-management with the intention of activating a process of evolutionary resilience of the Thessalian plain to flooding.

This project proposes a new conceptual framework for understanding risk and its components and a methodological approach for defining how the conditions of different systems affect risk and contribute to the systems’ biophysical and socio-technical limits. A set of criticality and transformability criteria is defined to locate the crucial areas – the critical zones – with the potentiality of transformation. This process is executed by superimposing the biophysical and socio-technical limits and taking into account the current coping and recovery capacities as expressed by the current centralized processes and local adaptation practices. Then, a set of transformative actions is proposed, consisting of biophysical measures drawing from soil and landscape-related nature-based solutions and of socio-technical measures aiming to enhance the learning capacity and preparedness of the community. These actions are subsequently implemented in a critical zone adjacent to the Karla Reservoir, through strategic, systemic, sub-systemic and specific design explorations, with the aim to concretely spatialize the proposed measures by showcasing possible negotiations between agriculture, water and nature. Finally, an adaptation framework and phasing through adaptive design pathways showcases and evaluates the operability of the proposed transformation. The overall goal of the project is the creation of a successful model for environmental co-management, integrating coping, recovery and adaptive capacity, and resulting in fostering evolutionary resilience.

With the Green Deal, Europe has the ambition to become the first climate neutral continent in the world in 2050. The current energy system, responsible for 75% of the greenhouse gas emissions, faces challenges including dependency on foreign sources and affordability. Furthermore, the energy system is dehumanized, while people play a pivotal role in the energy transition. The communities and stakeholders of South Limburg are in a constant conflict of space with overlapping functions, yet they are fragmented. The project aims to answer the question ‘How can we achieve a coherent South Limburg through an energy community collective?’ by examining the social, spatial-environmental and energy transition, with a focus on the role of young farming community through the strategy. Interviews with farmers revealed that farmers are open to adopting future-proof practices and emphasized the need for long-term policies and profitable business models.
This project looks at a new energy system which aims to be affordable, resilient and renewable and is integrated in the adapted landscape. Through decentralized energy collectives in the region’s stakeholders and communities will be actively involved in the energy production, distribution, storage and consumption. Farmers will transition to diversified practices which integrate the energy production in their business models. The new energy system requires balancing capitalism and individualism with collectivism and connection, prioritizing the common good over constant growth. Success in South Limburg could serve as a model for other energy collectives across the Netherlands and Europe, significantly advancing the goal of climate neutrality.
In the strategy there is a fine balance between the interconnectedness of the interventions in the strategy and the independence of the project. The interventions have to follow each other, and be connected to form an integrated strategy, but at the same time they have to be no-regret decisions that are valuable on their own. Key projects and policies have an immense value standing on their own and are independent from the rest. However, other interventions add more value to these, to strengthen the strategy as a whole. In the first phase, the collective mainly consists of farmers producing, and consuming energy. Over time residents, industry and others will be added to the collective to slowly establish an independent regional energy system.

The energy transition is advancing, and the share of renewable energy is increasing. The intermittent nature of these energy sources is introducing problems with energy security throughout the day and putting extra pressure on an already heavily congested electricity grid. To alleviate these problems, heavy investments in battery energy storage systems are necessary. But it is important that the energy transition is equitable, and all social classes benefit from it.
This study investigates how we can implement spatial strategies for renewable energy in the U16 region in order to promote an inclusive energy transition. Four communities were identified, and their profile was developed through street interviews, semi-structured interviews and literature review. Through spatial analyses the communities were identified in the U16 region. By connecting different communities in close proximity, clusters were identified which have high potential for collaborative energy strategies. Existing policy and regulation measures to promote sustainability measures were analyzed, and policies were developed to accelerate the deployment of renewable energy, alleviate congestion on the electricity grid and kickstart investments in large-scale battery energy storage deployments.
Two scenarios were developed, one scenario to reach the goal of becoming net carbon neutral in 2050, and one for the timeframe after. The scenario until 2050 includes technological strategies like large scale deployment of sodium-ion batteries, and plug-in solar panels to be installed on balconies and facades. Other strategies include investments by public and private parties in battery storage, and policy recommendations like building mandates and incentives for dynamic energy contracts. The interrelationship between communities is the core of these approaches, creating an interplay between the strengths and weaknesses of these groups. After 2050, strategies are suggested to develop large scale hydrogen production and storage to provide seasonal energy storage. Also, the development of an intercontinental energy grid is suggested, to deploy solar installations in countries around the equator. Using these methods, renewable energy can power society, while benefiting all demographics and communities.

To meet the United Nations’ target of global energy neutrality by 2050, a fundamental shift is needed in how we produce and consume energy. Though governments currently focus mainly on adapting, while mostly maintaining systems as they currently are, it becomes increasingly more clear that adaptation alone will not suffice. A systemic, structural transformation that redefines systems and industries is needed.
In the Netherlands, the energy transition is stuck, with political and private actors pointing fingers at each other. This is particularly evident in the horticulture sector, where environmental cost and energy consumption have long reached unsustainable levels. Westland, a municipality where nearly a quarter of Dutch horticulture is located, serves as the focal point in this research project. Within this theme, the focus lies on floriculture in particular, as it represents almost half of the greenhouses in Westland.
This project critically examines the current floriculture system and proposes a future-oriented alternative: a vision in which flower and energy production go hand in hand. In collaboration with conventional greenhouse owners and organic farmers, the project explores how these communities can be brought together to form one unified community of fully organic, energy-positive floriculture.
Methods used in this project include literary review, spatial analyses using QGIS and PDOK, interviews, and research by design. The energy transition is used as an opening for reimagining the floriculture landscape.
The analysis reveals three guiding themes: spatial quality, energy landscapes, and organic floriculture. These were linked to overarching goals of decentralisation, integration, identity and spatial and systematic openness. These inform two visions: one for Westland and one for the province of South Holland. A strategy in three phases outlines the implementation of the vision through policy, funding, agreements and key processes.
By 2060, the envisioned future sees Westland as a global pioneer in innovative and regenerative organic floriculture, where sustainability is not just a goal, but a lived reality.

Zeeland is a land of production of food, energy and resources. Its very nature is deeply rooted in the Dutch people‘s historical ability to reshape the landscape and harness its potential for economic benefit. Today, it faces slow demographic decline, is largely covered by agricultural land and sits at the heart of a thriving transnational port economy and embedded within the Delta region, an area defined by dynamism and uncertainty.

Complex processes driven by climate change - such as sea level rise, soil salinization and the depletion of soil quality - raise urgent questions about the future of many agricultural zones and the rural communities that depend on them. These are farming communities that have inhabited the region for centuries, now thrust into a structural condition of uncertainty, shaped by evolving ecological processes that are often hard to predict or fully understand.
At the same time, they are communities with clear socio-economic needs and aspirations, which sometimes clash with broader environmental pressures and global dynamics. Yet, they also hold significant potential: as landowners, they are well-positioned to convert or diversify their agricultural practices toward renewable energy production, carving out a vital role in the green economy of the future.
“What’s missing is a clear and stable vision for my future and my farm,” says Peter, a Zeeland farmer. That is exactly what Performative Landscape: A New Paradigm for Energy Transition Through Farmers’ Community Engagement and the Transformation of the Zeeland Delta Landscape seeks to offer.

Our team of designers and researchers developed a new long-term vision, ambitious yet grounded, that emerged from an intensive and focused process of research and designs. It aims to sustain regional productivity, reinforce the economic resilience of farming communities, address environmental challenges, and unlock the full potential of the land for renewable energy. It proposes a new model for productive landscapes, rooted in local consumption, circularity, economic autonomy and the integration of agriculture with clean energy generation.

The current condition of urban fragmentation in Bogotá
is the result of a long and complex historical process that (due to both external pressures related to the urban planning paradigms of modernity, as well as internal pressures from the Colombian armed conflict) has ended up defining a certain stance in the city’s development, both towards its natural environment and towards the various social groups inhabiting it. On one hand, the constant imposition
of progress models has ended up disintegrating the relationship that
the urban fabric has with ecological structures, generating a city that occurs on the margins of landscape dynamics. On the other hand, within the city planning process, the extensive internal cultural diversity of Bogotá has not been taken into account, resulting from forced displacement generated by the armed conflict, which led during the second half of the 20th century to a growing concentration
of different communities (originating from different regions) of the country in the main cities.
This thesis contemplates a series of strategies, both participatory and urban renewal, aimed at the urban cohesion of Bogotá. Through the implementation of the theory of “Design for the Pluriverse”, social and ecological diversity is embraced as a potential for city planning. This thesis focuses on a historical and spatial analysis of the conditions that led to Bogotá’s current condition through
a literature review and the use of GIS tools, resulting in a two-part proposal. The first part is a Participatory framework (Bottom-Up) to promote community-led land management. The second part consists of an
Urban Design (Top-Down) aimed at rehabilitating the ecosystem in which these communities reside.

Piura is a land of drastic, and even deadly, contrasts. It’s inherent desertic conditions makes water a scares resource; on the contrary, during El Niño phenomenon, heavy rainfalls are 60 times it’s average annual precipitation, resulting in oscillations between floods and droughts. Consequently, as the second biggest city of the country, over 2 million people are affected directly. The underlying issues arise from the disassociation between the natural environment and its habitation, resulting in a cycle of recurrent disasters. This research explores the intersection of urban morphology and geomorphology in order to find spaces that can mediate between them. Employing the longue duree theory and principals of evolutionary resilience, the project aims to understand and address the enduring geographical and urban structures in Piura. Above all, it recognized the fragility of the ecosystems for critical design and embraces an interdisciplinary approach across various scales, from the territorial to the material in order to integrate the changing water events within everyday life.

Desertification and depopulation are mutually reinforcing processes that cause global socio-ecological ecosystem vulnerability through land degradation. The dehesa landscape in Spain is especially vulnerable, facing severe threats from these combined pressures and urgently needing strategic intervention. This research explores the potential of adaptive strategic planning to mitigate the socio-environmental impacts of depopulation and desertification in the rural regions of northern Extremadura, Spain, particularly focusing on the dehesa landscape. By integrating a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods, this study analyses historical conditions and forecasts future scenarios, providing a holistic approach to environmental, ecological, social, economic, and political factors.
The use of cartography and GIS tools enhances spatial understanding and visualisation of impact distributions. The fieldwork, characterised by landscape photography and semi-structured interviews establishes a baseline understanding of the landscape’s health and land management practises. Furthermore, surveys delve deeper into community- and landscape identity, offering insights into local values and potential engagement in future scenarios.
These narratives reveal a strong community willingness to restore landscapes, dependent on clear visions for change, structured help in the form of technical knowledge of nature-based solutions, and incentives for ecosystem services. The findings suggest that an adaptive strategy, focusing on the active regeneration of the trees in the dehesa through a framework that integrates diverse actions over time, can reverse negative trends in landscape restoration. This research contributes to existing knowledge by highlighting the importance of community-engaged fieldwork and sustainable land management on a local scale to minimise effects of global processes.

This thesis interrogates the transformation of the Croatian coast, focusing on its identity beyond a touristic destination and examining the social and ecological impacts of tourism. The research poses crucial questions about the true character of the Croatian coast, the spatial elements introduced by tourism, and the resultant dissonances, as well as the role of urbanism and policy in these processes. Employing the proposed “tracing threads” method, this project traces and harmonizes dynamic processes across diverse systems and timescales, revealing interactions between more-than-human, human, and tourist perspectives. It emphasizes the ecological roles of elements like Posidonia oceanica meadows and the socio-economic importance of traditional practices. Conducted in Njivice on Krk island, the study proposes three main mechanisms for harmonisation: Protocols of Care and Repair, Regulative Actions, and Spatial Transformations. Care and Repair protocols derive from interdisciplinary research, informing stakeholders and guiding policy. Regulative Actions transform these protocols into planning and legislative measures, while Spatial Transformations apply these principles to physical spaces. This culminates in the sympoiesis of attraction, addressing the paradox where tourism’s allure simultaneously threatens its foundation, aiming to realign and harmonize the coast’s multifaceted landscape.

The Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH) Metropolitan Region faces significant challenges, including drought, severe precipitation, floods, subsidence, societal disparities, air pollution, and an aging population. Fragmented spatial and institutional frameworks hinder effective responses, perpetuating vulnerabilities. This study focuses on enhancing water resilience with an emphasis on environmental justice in vulnerable areas between major cities. The proposed low-density development approach aims to balance economic productivity with ecological sensitivity, creating a decentralized, self-reliant, and resilient region.
The strategy integrates ecosystem-based adaptation, integrated water resources management, and water-sensitive village reorganization. A shift from a profit-centric model to one prioritizing water risk reduction in vulnerable areas is crucial for achieving environmental justice. The research employs pattern languages and the dynamic adaptive pathway method to organize potential measures, integrating future objectives, intervention patterns, and scenarios to feasibly implement actions by 2060.
Ultimately, the research envisions self-resilient units contributing crucial ecosystem services to urban centers and receiving support through knowledge exchange and economic assistance. This transformation will turn these units from sacrificial entities into integral components of sustainable development in the BTH region. Validated by both quantitative and qualitative assessments, this shift is anticipated to strengthen the water resilience of individual units and enhance the overall resilience of the metropolitan area.

This report presents our proposal for “Globalisation Free Choice,” an elective course for master’s students in the Faculty of Architecture and the Built Environment at TU Delft, in collaboration with The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU). The course aims to explore sustainable and integrated development and its regional impacts.

During the 9 weeks of the course, a regional vision and strategy for the Greater Bay Area was prepared. The Greater Bay Area is a global centre for economic development located in the Pearl River Delta in the Southern part of China. In this report we describe how we want to instigate a paradigm shift from focusing on megaprojects to working in mega-processes. In the first two weeks we analysed the environmental, social and economic situation of the area to create a problem statement and define focus points. The next two weeks were spent in Hong Kong at the Polytechnic University where the morphological game boarding strategy was used to look at regional design in a more experimental way. We created two games - one focused on the social perspective including the liveability within the region, and the other based on the morphological perspective, looking at spatial changes. During these two weeks and during the playing of the game we defined two interesting zoom-in locations in the area.

The first zoom in location is the border between Hong Kong and Shenzhen, an area which is already planned to grow into an innovative tech hub. Due to the rejoining of Hong Kong with Mainland China in 2047, the border will be eliminated, opening a lot of opportunities for development. The other location is the Nansha district near Guangzhou, which lies in the heart of the delta. Major development plans consisting of various megaprojects are proposed by the Chinese government in Nansha, which will disrupt the natural cycle of the water and soil. The two zoom-in locations will be used to develop an approach to integrate the built more with the green-blue networks to mitigate floods, droughts and heat island effect.

We then returned to Delft to develop a vision and strategy for the GBA, focusing on these megaprojects and thinking of ways to change the current way in which they are executed. We used an element-based approach inspired by the book ‘the Elemental Metropolis’ to develop a strategy of working in a more agile, process-based way. We conclude the report by revisiting the entire Greater Bay Area to identify additional regions where the insights from our work on the two focus areas can be applied, aiming to create a resilient, adaptable, and liveable dynamic delta.

In response to the need for robust and extensive green infrastructure in Monterrey, Mexico, this thesis will explore the potentialities of upscaling urban forestry and regional afforestation as a solution. The metropolitan area of Monterrey, and it’s urban landscape morphology, is facing severe environmental pressures shaped by a conflict between powerful natural forces, such as extreme weather events and deforestation, and turbulent human activities, such as urban expansion and poor management of natural areas. This results in an inaccessible, fragmented natural landscape. This thesis will define forest types suitable for arid climates, assess which ecosystems services an afforestation plan will deliver, and design strategies for sustainable, long-term green-blue infrastructures. The project’s results contribute to enhancing ecosystem services, defragmenting the natural landscape, and harmonizing the relationship between people and nature. The research also identifies the key challenges and barriers to expanding Monterrey’s green network, by creating a value map, and proposing design interventions for overcoming them. These findings will emphasize the potential of regional afforestation in arid urban landscapes and underscore the significance of ecosystem-based adaptation. Finally, this thesis proposes an evolutionary framework to find the potential capacities to connect Monterrey’s landscape patches with the natural protected areas.

The Dutch greenhouse industry contributing 19% of the national carbon emissions, highlights its significant role in the ever-increasing environmental, social, and political challenges developing from climate change. Geopolitical tensions including the war in Ukraine and the Covid-19 pandemic, coupled with resource scarcity and a world population growth underscore the urgency of transitioning societal practices within the food-energy nexus. Existing policies such as the European Green Deal emphasize the need to transition toward renewable energy. Given the horticulture sector’s substantial spatial and global exportation footprint, there is potential to strategically utilize these spaces and economic flows. If successful, Dutch greenhouses can be the catalyst for a circular society model that emphasizes environmental regeneration, peri-urban community empowerment, and representative policy.

This report builds from theories including social justice, circular economy, glocalization, and regenerating peri-urban landscapes. By applying a circular society framework, which prioritizes sustainable consumption patterns, co-created policy, and spatial justice, this report develops a regional strategy for connecting and diversifying greenhouse sub-regions. The goals of this strategy include enhancing community engagement, ecological restoration, innovative knowledge-based production, and fully renewably sourced systems. An analysis through the lens of these intended goals leads to an instruction manual for redesigning industrial landscapes and an index of potential building blocks to implement in the redesign.

This instruction manual offers to scientific relevance through a large-scale combination of innovations, and a circular 15-minute social and 30-minute economic system, and societal relevance through lowering political unrest and the combination of technical and social functions. The manual is useful for a diverse range of parties including municipalities, policymakers, scientists, students, and residents.

Ultimately, SowGrowConnect aims for a future where greenhouse regions are not just endless rows of glasshouses but inclusive and diverse energy and social landscapes.

The Netherlands holds the title of the world’s second-largest exporter of agricultural goods, primarily due to Wageningen University’s pioneering research and innovation. However, this success has led to significant challenges. Intensive farming practices have strained resources and disrupted local water and soil cycles, sparking protests from frustrated farmers. Moreover, the quality of fresh water in the Dutch Delta has deteriorated due to pollutants like NO2 and PO4, exacerbated by increasing salinization pressure from the North Sea. This linear system has resulted in waste accumulation and biodiversity loss, endangering both agriculture and natural ecosystems’ sustainability.

To address these challenges, our goal is to integrate nature into existing agricultural practices, thus restoring a balance with local ecosystems. The AgriNature project aims to achieve this by analysing the interplay between agriculture and nature, assessing water and soil management spatially, and fostering a participatory approach with farmers.

The first phase of this transition starts with engaging farmers who are already implementing sustainable methods like agroforestry and saline agriculture, the project establishes Living Labs for co-creation, knowledge sharing, and policy influence. Waterboards and governmental agencies will mediate and provide support, connecting farmers to stakeholders and creating financial incentives. The project also recognizes the necessity of a protein transition towards more plant-based or lab-grown alternatives, aiming to decrease nitrogen pollution and eventually rewild cattle. In the second phase, AgriNature plans to expand innovations to other farmers and establish Agroparks as hubs for innovation and technology. Consumer awareness centres will promote understanding of the protein transition and the need for biodiversity. A nature regeneration centre will oversee rewilding efforts and flood risk management using nature-based solutions. The third phase will future proof these efforts by continuing innovations within the established research and development networks.

Ultimately, AgriNature envisions a symbiotic relationship between agriculture and nature, empowering farmers as stewards of the land and promoting ecologically sensitive practices. Through multidisciplinary collaboration and integration of natural cycles into urban planning and agriculture, the project aims to serve as a global model for sustainability, fostering soil health, water conservation, and biodiversity preservation.

Currently, the Southwestern Delta is ill. The inability to produce its essential ecosystem services hinders the Delta from being healthy. Systems that make the Delta economy prosper are the main reasons for this obstruction. If current hazards like salinisation, soil depletion, and nitrogen pollution continue; the livelihood of the peri-urban Delta communities will be under threat. In contrast, the direct relation to the Delta makes them a potential stepping stone for change.

The main question: ‘How can local peri-urban communities be the base of the just transition towards a healthy Delta, which restores the production of ecosystem services and improves the climate resilience of the Delta?’ forms the foundation of this research. This research aims to explore the potential of communities as the missing link in the just transition towards a healthy Delta.

By creating a vision and designing its strategy, the Delta area will be able to produce its ecosystem services from 2050 on. The combination of environmental assessments, mapping and spatial analysis, stakeholder engagement, a SWOT matrix, the development of action perspectives through scenario planning, and a policy review provides the base for a vision towards a healthy Delta. This vision is translated into a strategy where a design catalogue, community engagement approach, and a knowledge network bring everything together in the spatialisation of three zoom-in areas: Schouwen-Duivenland, Oesterdijk, and Haringvliet.

Through education and recognition, the awareness of the Delta communities will rise which will motivate them to be part of the urgent transition towards a healthy Delta. Field labs and knowledge centres stimulate cooperation and sharing of knowledge. The ecosystem can be restored through the collaboration of the communities with other stakeholders. The combination of ecosystem-based adaptation, knowledge networks, and the borderless approach creates a regenerative and resilient Delta that serves as an example to other estuaries in the world.

This study seeks to understand the interrelationship between daily mobility and the spatial structure of an emerging metropolitan urban system. It is concerned with the daily mobility of a specific group of inhabitants, higher education students, living in a contemporary metropolis and experiencing urban living. The study’s main aim is to better understand aspects of this complex urban spatial structure through the students’ lives and through their daily mobility to explore specific urban spatial dynamics and trends. This study therefore considers the effects of an accelerated urbanisation process and the development of an increasingly fragmented and segregated socioeconomic environment. In doing so, it highlights the ways in which rapid urban expansion in developing countries has tended to reproduce or maintain a range of inequalities In this study, how the student population lives, works, studies, and spends its leisure time within the Valparaiso Metropolitan Area (VMA) proves to be dependent on a complex of structural factors. Such day-to-day activities are further shaped by more dynamic and perhaps more subtle influences such as the changing functions of the urban space, increasing socioeconomic fragmentation and segmentation and the inequitable provision of public transport across what is a topographically complex area. This research within this study however demonstrates that a better understanding of an individuals’ daily mobility can make visible urban trends that have previously been left undisturbed by the existing traditional origin and destination surveys. The research therefore serves to highlight the social and economic flows that continue to shape the metropolitan spatial structure.

The Paraná Delta, a vital component of the La Plata river basin, is facing severe environmental degradation due to human activities and external pressures. This thesis explores the adaptive capacity of the deltaic system and stakeholders in the ‘Los Pájaros y sus Pueblos Libres’ reserve (LPPL), aiming to propose a strategy for sustainable development of the delta as a whole. The study aims to investigate biophysical processes, governmental policies, and socio-economic and cultural characteristics related to the delta and to propose a strategy for enhancing and promoting sustainable development in the region. A thorough literature review has been conducted regarding relevant existing research and data collection has primarily relied on desk research, (GIS-)data sourcing, and policy documents. Additionally, interviews with experts have been conducted and a thorough site visit has been undertaken. The results of the research contribute to the understanding of the ecological value of deltas and reveal the critical environmental degradation and diminishing ecosystem services specifically in the LPPL area in the Paraná Delta. The thesis emphasizes the importance of adopting a multifaceted and integrated approach that addresses the challenges faced by the delta. It underscores the significance of developing an adaptation plan based on NBS and strongly considering and reviving local knowledge for socially and culturally acceptable solutions. Stakeholder engagement emerges as a crucial factor in fostering collaborations and partnerships that promote a collective system of care and enable sustainable practices. The proposed strategy also advocates for localized interventions that can serve as a driving force for positive change in the entire delta. Sustainable tourism is identified as a strategic tool for conservation and regeneration, raising awareness about the delta’s ecological value and diversifying the existing local economic model greatly dependent on intensive agricultural practices and responsible for the loss of ecosystems. Finally, the thesis challenges the existing conservation framework and proposes a more flexible and adaptive approach that recognizes the interconnectedness of the delta and its surrounding areas.

The Wadden Sea Region spans the Dutch, German, and Denmark coasts, creating one of the most culturally and environmentally rich areas, recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage in 2009 (Centre, U. W. H, 2009). The natural and cultural value of the heritage site possesses unique features and characteristics that are important to preserve for future generations. Like many other places in the world, the Wadden Sea region is facing significant uncertainty in the future. Climate change plays a vital role in planning such a vulnerable region. It is a complex landscape that has already been impacted by climate change and is awaiting big decisions and changes for its resilient future.

Due to its unique history, the Frisian landscape has developed into the largest dairy producer in the Netherlands. Years of scaling up and production growth created a situation in which the productive landscape conflicts with Friesland’s cultural and natural heritage and contributes to climate change. The Frisian agricultural practice puts immense pressure on the peat soils in the province, resulting in significant carbon emissions and is likely to contribute to water shortages in the future. “Peatlands are the largest terrestrial carbon store on earth, storing about 25% of global soil carbon, which is twice as much as forests” (UN Environment Programme, 2019). Peatlands have immense value both for the region’s natural and cultural development.

The graduation project looks into the past, present, and future of the agricultural landscape of Friesland. It aims to envision an alternative resilient future for its peatscapes, in which the productive properties of the landscape are not lost but strengthen the cultural and natural Frisian narrative of the future. The future scenarios are formed based on different outcomes related to agricultural practices, through which the most desired one is explored further. The thesis seeks an in-depth analysis of the productive landscape, resulting in a strategic design proposal for peat restoration and preservation. The strategies are implemented in close conversation with the local stakeholders on a regional and small scale-design. The alternative scenario involves strategies that strengthen ecological connectivity and cultural heritage while proposing acts for climate mitigation and adaptation. Further exploration on forming carbon banks, paludiculture corridors, and people nature is all part of the project for peat restoration and preservation for future generations.

The survival and development of the city of Maastricht are facing enormous threats from the increasingly frequent and severe fluvial floods, while the leisure industry is the most vulnerable to flood damage as a crucial segment of the economy, accounting for about 50% of the total economic damage. However, flooding is essentially just a natural process with numerous ecological benefits, and can even stimulate diverse recreational activities under certain conditions.

Therefore, this report aims to explore integrated transformation from an urban design perspective for the city of Maastricht to adapt to river flooding and to promote sustainable leisure industry. It implies a transformed urban fabric that prevents the damage caused by river flooding and converts floods into a resource for sustainable leisure industry development through a series of spatial interventions and programs that cross three scales (regional scale, city scale, and neighborhood scale).