Nature-based solutions use a holistic viewpoint to address social challenges while providing environmental, social and economic benefits simultaneously. The Victoria Quay is a historical space with complex social and environmental issues. This study uses an investigation-oriented method to explore the re-planning strategies. The environmental problems are addressed by extending the green infrastructure into the site to recover the ecological corridor and alleviate flooding risks. The originally single land-use type is changed, and several historical buildings are transformed into landmarks to improve the connection with city center by linking the ‘golden route’. All the proposed measures tried to reactivate the various relationships rather than merely renew the Victoria Quay.

Brigittaplatz located in the 20th district of Vienna, which is a mixed culture residential community with various issues. This paper attempts to uncover the existing problems, weaknesses, potential opportunities of the site and explore a set of local interventions to accomplish site regeneration through architectural and landscape measures. Study utilizes two axes to improve and reconnect the public service, green corridor as well as the interactive relationship. All the proposed interventions are not merely public facility renewal but a new functional and social design, which is trying to reactivate the various relationships in the site that can enhance the quality of life and carry over the impact to larger scales. Authors seek a holistic approach to regenerate Brigittaplatz.

This study focuses on exploring the impact of urban forms and vegetation combination patterns on the microclimate in a complex urban environment. Results shown that the closed urban form has higher air temperature resulting in pedestrians are easier to feel heat stress; instead, the open urban form usually has higher wind speed. Vegetation can effectively reduce wind speed while reducing the change rate of the mean radiant temperature. However, the effect on air temperature and humidity are most distinct in the morning. Trees and shrubs could improve the surrounding thermal comfort conditions by reducing heat stress, but this effect depends on the density of the leaf area. More importantly, study has not found that the ground cover plants contribute to the improvement of thermal comfort.

The 1992, the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development highlighted that human impacts on the environment should be reduced. Against this backdrop, publications on restorative and regenerative urban design first appeared in the mid-1990s, and both disciplines have developed rapidly up to the present time. However, there is still some uncertainty regarding the interrelationships and differences between these two terms, and their association with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Based on a search of the Web of Science database, a total of 117 papers were studied with the help of VOS viewer and R studio. The differences between the two disciplines and their respective associations with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals were analyzed using key performance indicators. Detailed analysis was used to explore their current development status. Scientific publication and citation network analyses were used to examine the historical developments and interrelationships between two disciplines. The review revealed that both disciplines are closely related to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, especially regenerative urban design, but they have developed independently in the field of urban design. Unlike the descriptions found in many of the identified papers, restorative urban design not only focuses on ecological aspects but also attempts to create a built environment that allows its users to thrive both physically and mentally. Regenerative urban design is more inclined to restore or create an “ability”. Further, both disciplines are in their infancy but have evolved from internal conceptual development to the stage of exploring external relationships and frameworks as well as mechanisms. This review found that although many frameworks and models are used to support and evaluate these two disciplines, almost all of them fail to integrate necessary aspects of the ecosystem, e.g., elements, relationships, processes, etc. Moreover, future work should examine the design patterns that are closely related to restorative and regenerative urban design to better guide the concrete practice.