The ecodesign of urban environments at different spatial scales6 is an emerging topic fostered by the research on ecodesign and urban sustainability. Urban areas and environments are expanding worldwide. Statistics of urban population share reach figures of 70% in Europe, America and Oceania and 50% globally1. This ever-increasing urban population is likely to grow even more2. With this unprece...

The response of local economies to the globalization process can have a large effect on population and land-use dynamics. In countries with a high population density and relatively high levels of education, the globalization process has resulted in a shift in the local economy from agriculture to manufacturing, technology, and service sectors. This shift in the economy has impacted land-use dyn...

This century is marked by rapid urbanization. Some statistics predict that the world’s urban population will reach five billion by 2030 (United Nations 2007). This rapid urbanization not only has resulted in expanded land-use, but also has led to population increases in urban areas and development-related environmental impacts. Researchers, therefore, have begun to be concerned about the relati...

The City of Barcelona has a population of just over 1.5 million inhabitants. The Metropolitan Region Barcelona (RMB) extends to some 3,236 km and according to the 2001 Census has a population of almost 4.4 million inhabitants. In recent years the population of the City of Barcelona has been in decline, in contrast to marked demographic increases in the wider metropolitan area. Indeed the RMB ha...

The future health of ecosystems is arguably as dependent on urban sprawl as it is on human-caused climatic warming. Urban sprawl strongly impacts the urban ecosystems it creates and the natural and agro-ecosystems that it displaces and fragments. Here, we project urban sprawl changes for the next 50 years for the fast-growing Southeast U.S. Previous studies have focused on modeling population d...

The urban experience " An inhabited place of greater size, population, or importance than a town or village " is the Merriam-Webster Dictionary entry for " city ". Most definitions, unless referring to very particular usages (e.g.: The City as London's financial district), convey the concept of a status granted to a relatively permanent, organized human settlement. The Chambers Dictionary inclu...

There is a growing recognition that the present demographic patterns in sub-Saharan Africa, including Ghana, do not augur well for the achievement of sustainable development. Ghana is characterized by a youthful population, rapid population growth, uneven population distribution, high fertility, and rural-urban migration which has brought human numbers into collision with resources to sustain ...