Connect habitats and facilitate dispersal

Ecological connectivity is essential for species survival and the long-term resilience of urban ecosystems [1]. This category focuses on creating opportunities for movement of birds, insects, animals, plants, and even ecological processes, across fragmented urban landscapes. This can be achieved by enabling species dispersal, softening habitat edges, and aligning ecological networks [2, 3]. 

This section includes four interconnected categories, each offering a strategy for improving ecological connectivity in urban areas:

  1. Enable species movement through urban areas
  2. Plan for climate-responsive connectivity
  3. Restore and create buffers to mitigate habitat edges
  4. Connect human spaces with ecological ones

Design Implications

Designers can enhance connectivity of urban ecosystems by embedding habitat corridors, stepping stone habitats, and creating layered or softened transitions between ecosystems into infrastructure and landscapes [1, 4]. This may include connected tree canopies, green roofs, pollinator pathways, and soft-edged buffer zones. Designing for water permeability, both physical and ecological, requires a careful balance between built form and natural function [5]. Aligning connectivity strategies (like habitat corridors) with walkways, signage, and shared spaces can also build public awareness and shared responsibility [6].

Planning Implications
Planning for ecological connectivity means thinking  at multiple scales from an individual site to landscape-scale networks. Planners can support connectivity by creating and protecting dispersal corridors embedding ecological infrastructure into urban growth strategies. Ecological corridors have potential to act simultaneously as social pathways supporting opportunities for interactions with urban biodiversity. Planning tools, such as district plans, environmental strategies, green network frameworks, and pro-biodiversity conditions on resource consents for developments can ensure enduring, connected urban ecologies.

References:

  1. Hilty, J., Worboys, G. L., Keeley, A., Woodley, S., Lausche, B. J., Locke, H., … & Tabor, G. M. (2020). Guidelines for conserving connectivity through ecological networks and corridors.
  2. Donati, G. F., Bolliger, J., Psomas, A., Maurer, M., & Bach, P. M. (2022). Reconciling cities with nature: Identifying local Blue-Green Infrastructure interventions for regional biodiversity enhancement. Journal of Environmental Management, 316, 115254.
  3. Lawson, G. (2010). Networks cities and ecological habitats. Networks Cities, 250-253.
  4. Lynch, A. J. (2019). Creating effective urban greenways and stepping-stones: four critical gaps in habitat connectivity planning research. Journal of Planning Literature, 34(2), 131-155.
  5. Marchioni, M., & Becciu, G. (2015). Experimental results on permeable pavements in urban areas: A synthetic review. International Journal of Sustainable Development and Planning, 10(6), 806-817.
  6. Keeley, A. T., Basson, G., Cameron, D. R., Heller, N. E., Huber, P. R., Schloss, C. A., … & Merenlender, A. M. (2018). Making habitat connectivity a reality. Conservation Biology, 32(6), 1221-1232.

1. Enable species movement through urban areas

Design strategies that enable animals and plants to cross the city, such as connected tree canopies, wildlife-friendly road infrastructure, and green roofs, can help species safely navigate and occupy otherwise hostile urban landscapes [1,2]. Creating corridors, stepping stone habitats, and integrated movement structures supports ecological resilience and allows for dynamic species behaviours across mixed urban environments [3, 4].

References:

  1. Burg, J et al. 2023. Ecology for Health: Design Guidance for Fostering Human Health and Biodiversity in Cities. SFEI Contribution No. 1130. San Francisco Estuary Institute: Richmond, CA.
  2. Ersoy E. Landscape ecology practices in planning: landscape connectivity and urban networks. In: Ergen M, editor. Sustainable Urbanization [Internet]. InTech; 2016 [cited 2021 Aug 4]. Available from: http://www.intechopen.com/books/sustainable-urbanization/landscape-ecology-practices-in-planning-landscape-connectivity-and-urban-networks.
  3. Lynch, A. J. (2019). Creating effective urban greenways and stepping-stones: four critical gaps in habitat connectivity planning research. Journal of Planning Literature, 34(2), 131-155.
  4. MacKinnon, M., Pedersen Zari, M., & Brown, D. K. (2023). Improving urban habitat connectivity for native birds: using least-cost path analyses to design urban green infrastructure networks. Land, 12(7), 1456.

2. Plan for climate-responsive connectivity

As climate conditions shift, species may need to move to find suitable habitat [1]. This category focuses on designing urban ecological networks that anticipate and accommodate these movements by maintaining or establishing pathways along climatic gradients, latitudinal, altitudinal, or hydrological. Strategies may include planting for future climates, enabling movement between cooler and warmer microclimates, creating more microhabitats in cities, and protecting long-term dispersal corridors to ensure species can adapt to environmental change [2] .

References:

  1. Macinnis‐Ng, C., Mcintosh, A. R., Monks, J. M., Waipara, N., White, R. S., Boudjelas, S., … & Peltzer, D. A. (2021). Climate‐change impacts exacerbate conservation threats in island systems: New Zealand as a case study. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, 19(4), 216-224.
  2. Schloss, C. A., Cameron, D. R., McRae, B. H., Theobald, D. M., & Jones, A. (2022). “No‐regrets” pathways for navigating climate change: Planning for connectivity with land use, topography, and climate. Ecological Applications, 32(1), e02468.

3. Restore and create buffers to mitigate habitat edges

Edges between built and natural areas can prevent ecological exchange (e.g. species moving between habitats), and can create other issues such as promoting weed incursion into natural areas [1, 2]. Designing and restoring buffers and soft transitions around habitat patches helps reduce these negative edge effects [2, 3]. Indigenous planting, layered vegetation, noise and light barriers, buffer zones, and gradual microclimate transitions can all contribute to functional and resilient habitat edges that support species dispersal and persistence.

References:

  1. Hellenbrand, J. P., Kelly-Voicu, P., Bowers, J. T., & Reinmann, A. B. (2025). Edge and the city: Evaluating the role of edge effects on urban forest structure and tree species composition. Urban Forestry & Urban Greening, 107, 128745.
  2. Shanahan, D.F., Strohbach, M.W., Warren, P.S., Fuller, R.A. (2014) The challenges of urban living. In Avian Urban Ecology, pp 3-20
  3. Bennett, G., & Mulongoy, K. J. (2006). Review of experience with ecological networks, corridors and buffer zones. In Secretariat of the convention on biological diversity, Montreal, Technical Series (Vol. 23, p. 100). Montreal, QC, Canada: Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity.

4. Connect human spaces with ecological ones

It is important to align strategies that promote ecological connections with human infrastructure, such as walking paths, signage, or shared spaces, to foster social engagement with biodiversity [1]. Designing for visibility, education, and co-stewardship helps embed ecology and biodiversity into everyday urban life and promotes long-term care and respect for species movement through cities [2]. Buildings and infrastructure can be integrated into urban ecologies and vice versa rather than being kept separate [3].

References:

  1. Keeley, A. T., Basson, G., Cameron, D. R., Heller, N. E., Huber, P. R., Schloss, C. A., … & Merenlender, A. M. (2018). Making habitat connectivity a reality. Conservation Biology, 32(6), 1221-1232.
  2. Visintin, C., Garrard, G. E., Weisser, W. W., Baracco, M., Hobbs, R. J., & Bekessy, S. A. (2025). Designing cities for everyday nature. Conservation Biology, 39(1), e14328.
  3. Pedersen Zari, M., MacKinnon, M., Varshney, K., & Bakshi, N. (2022). Regenerative living cities and the urban climate–biodiversity–wellbeing nexus. Nature Climate Change, 12(7), 601-604.