WIT Conferences: Sustainable City 2021

15th International Conference on Urban Regeneration and Sustainability

5–7 October 2021

Online

Overview

With due consideration to our delegates’ well-being, but also believing that the scientific community should not be stopped from accessing and communicating new research, WIT decided that Sustainable City 2021 should take place as an online rather than a live event in Bilbao, Spain, as originally scheduled.

The conference was organised by the Wessex Institute, UK, represented by Dr Stavros Syngellakis.

The conference series, which started in Rio, Brazil in 2000 is well-established and always attracts a wide, international spread of delegates. The challenge of planning sustainable contemporary cities lies in considering the dynamics of urban systems, exchange of energy and matter, and the function and maintenance of ordered structures directly or indirectly supplied and maintained by natural systems. The task of researchers is to improve the capacity to manage human activities, pursuing welfare and prosperity in the urban environment. Any investigation or planning on a city ought to consider the relationships between the parts and their connections with the living world. The dynamics of its networks (flows of energy matter, people, goods, information and other resources) are fundamental for an understanding of the evolving nature of today’s cities.

Opening of the Conference

The conference was opened by Dr Stavros Syngellakis who welcomed the delegates to the event.

Invited Presentations

There were a series of invited lectures on advanced topics of research and applications, as follows:

“Climate neutral and smart cities: a European policies’ overview”
by D. Longo, University of Bologna, Italy.
“Nature based solutions and sustainable urban drainage systems prototypes for the Portuense district in Rome”,
by R. Magini, University of Rome 'La Sapienza', Italy
“Mental maps of Lisbon metropolis as a teaching strategy in urban geography”
by I. M. Madaleno, University of Lisbon, Portugal
“Sustainability of housing typologies in historic sites”
by A. Acosta Collazo, Autonomous University of Aguascalientes, Mexico
“The future of dwelling: alleviating the residential crisis with modular architecture”
by C. Cerro, American University of Sharjah, UAE
“Estimating and updating gap acceptance parameters for HCM6th roundabout capacity model applications”
by A. Pratelli, University of Pisa, Italy

Conference Sessions

The papers presented during the conference were classified under the following headings:

Urban strategies
Planning, development and management
Circular economy at city level
Urban metabolism
The community and the city
Social, cultural and economic aspects
Architectural Issues
The S3 city: smart, sustainable and safe
Urban transportation and planning
Environmental management
Water resources
Waste management
Urban agriculture

Q&A Live Zoom Session

Conference delegates were invited to participate in three Q&A Live Zoom Sessions which took place on 5th, 6th and 7th October 2021. These friendly sessions were a great opportunity for participants to interact with each other and ask authors questions about their papers.

Conference Publication

Papers presented at this conference are published in Vol. 253 of the WIT Transactions on Ecology and the Environment (ISSN 1743-3541). Papers presented at the meeting are available Open Access in the eLibrary of the Wessex Institute (https://www.witpress.com/elibrary) from where they can be freely downloaded by any interested parties.

A few papers were selected for publication in the International Journal of Transport Development and Integration. This Journal covers all transportation modes and the general topic of transport systems, with particular emphasis on their integration and harmonisation.

Closing of the Conference

We are very sorry that we were not able to meet our delegates in person this year.

We would like to thank the delegates for participating in the event and look forward to meeting them at the next conference in the series which is due to be reconvened in 2022.