Urban ecosystem services are crucial for human well-being and the livability of cities. A central challenge for sustaining ecosystem services lies in addressing scale mismatches between ecological processes on one hand, and social processes of governance on the other. This article synthesizes a set of case studies from urban green areas in Stockholm, Sweden—allotment gardens, urban parks, cemet...

Much attention has been paid to the impacts of plastics and other debris on marine organisms, but the effects of plastic on terrestrial organisms have been largely ignored. Detrimental effects of terrestrial plastic could be most pronounced in intensively human-modified landscapes (e.g., urban and agricultural areas), which are a source of much anthropogenic debris. Here, we examine the occurre...

T. Elmqvist et al. (eds.), Urbanization, Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services: Challenges and Opportunities: A Global Assessment, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-7088-1_10, © The Authors 2013 Abstract Urbanization destroys or modifi es native habitats and creates new ones with its infrastructure. Because of these changes, urban landscapes favor non-native and native species that are generalists. Neverthe...

To study the effects of growth management efforts on urban fringe areas in Washington State’s Puget Sound region, USA, this study documents and quantifies transformations in land cover and land-use from 1974 to 1998 for a 474 km2 study area east of Seattle. Geo-referenced aerial photographs (orthophotos) were digitized, then classified, to compare patch patterns (clustered versus dispersed vege...

Pollinator-plant relationships are found to be particularly vulnerable to land use change. Yet despite extensive research in agricultural and natural systems, less attention has focused on these interactions in neighboring urban areas and its impact on pollination services. We investigated pollinator-plant interactions in a peri-urban landscape on the outskirts of the San Francisco Bay Area, Ca...

The increase of coastal erosion due to intense tropical storms and unsustainable urban development in Vietnam demands vulnerability assessments at different research scales. This study proposes (1) a new approach classify coastlines (2) suitable criteria evaluate index (CVI) national regional/local At the scale, Vietnamese coastline was separated into 72 cells from 8 coast types based on natura...

Since the campus of the Federal University of Juiz de Fora, Minas Gerais State, Brazil, has different landscapes, it turns up to be a useful ecological model to evaluate the influence of habitat heterogeneity on bird communities. Our research goals were to know the local avifauna and compare its composition and bird diversity within the different landscapes. Species were identified in point cou...

Urbanization is a highly disperse process, resulting in urban sprawl across landscapes. Within such landscapes, structural heterogeneity may be an important factor for maintaining biodiversity. We investigated the importance of habitat on bats villages Schwäbische Alb, Germany, progressively urbanized region. Bat activity and diversity were assessed using acoustic monitoring. characterized comp...