Urban Greening for Biodiversity Net Gain: A Design Guide

To help meet the challenges of a growing city and the climate and ecological emergency, there must be a step change in how development relates to London’s natural environment. As well as continuing to protect the most valuable green and wild places, new development proposals need also to strengthen London’s green infrastructure and ecological networks. This guide shows how this can be achieve through good design, whilst also creating engaging, healthy and resilient places, helping to reduce Londoners’ exposure to air pollution and enabling the city to adapt to climate change. It introduces simple design considerations for different types of urban greening features which help to make space for nature in our built environments. This document is relevant to anyone involved in the design of new developments. It should not be seen as a replacement for ecological or landscape advice, rather its aim is to inspire more projects to consider how they can adopt an interdisciplinary approach to make the city greener and wilder.