Biodiversity Station is a device for a Nature-base Solution for healthy cities and active citizens.
Covid Lockdown has been a chance for all of us to look at public green spaces in a new way: on one hand we felt the strong need to be connected with nature, in urban parks and gardens, on the other hand we saw that if we're not constantly present, cities are being taken over by nature very quickly, shining a light on wilderness.
So our proposal tries to answer the following questions: Is nature claiming back the city? How can we build a novel, urban ecosystems for the future?
We all know that today biodiversity is undergoing a strong decline with unprecedented rates of extinction in human history. Within a few decades, about 1 million animal and plant species will disappear, and the causes are all linked to human activities. Nevertheless, urban ecosystem can be particularly rich in spontaneous species, in many cases even richer than the surrounding natural areas.
The presence and richness of urban biodiversity are also linked to the extraordinary value and sense of belonging and connection that nature inspires us, as evidenced by the reports of the Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES, 2020 ), and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment launched (UN, 2001).
Our Biodiversity Stations (BS) is a green infrastructure conceived with the aim to reflects, at the local level, the international mobilization for a New Deal for Nature, in order to promote vibrant and green, sustainable and resilient cities and to raise awareness about biodiversity loss.
The BS is a very simple structure, composed of a vertical metal bar, on which various wooden elements are fixed and connected, including a bench, a container for plants, two bugs-hotel, a bat-house, and a bird feeders.The plants selection includes resilient species that grow spontaneously and attract butterflies. BS includes also scientific panels and QR code linked to several languages descriptive web pages, useful to understand natural processes.
Adaptable to any context, our BS is a modular device whose dimensions can vary according to the needs and characteristics of the places chosen to host it, from a little terrace to the middle of a lawn, in a park, in a square, along a wall or in a courtyard.
