An additional research aim was to test #AI tools for landscape research.

AI tools were effective for creating scenario landscape visualisations and may be an key tool for expanding participatory research methods, such as photo collages to depict desired #FutureLandscapes 🧵(10/10)

With a new government willing to rethink #GreenBelts we are at an opportune time for #change

We argue they should be “strategic urban support landscapes” to help city regions adapt to a changing climate, reframing their spatial proximity which once made them a planning challenge, as an asset🧵(9/10)

Nearly all stakeholder involved felt that #GreenBelts need change for the 21st Century.

The #Multifunctional scenario was perceived as having most benefits, likely and preferred.

There is substantial cross-sector consensus for more (multi)functional Green Belts as a uniting framework 🧵(8/10)

The co-developed scenarios reveal #GreenBelts are under increased pressure from multiple land-uses, societal demands, and policies, many of which are in conflict, stemming from either a prioritisation or balancing of these demands through varying governance mechanisms.🧵(7/10)

3: Multifunctional 🌳🏘️A joined up policy agenda recognises the functional potential of Green Belt landscapes, seeking to integrate policy to manage trade-offs and deliver important ecosystem services, alongside much needed affordable housing and strategic growth. 🧵(6/10)

2: Build-Build-Build 🏘️: Green Belts are eased around the urban edge to meet increasing market demands for housing in a growing housing crisis. But at the expense of wider benefits to ecosystem services, under an uncoordinated approaches and absence of strategic planning. 🧵(5/10)

1: Intensify & Diversify 🚜- Driven by global food and energy markets and supported by planning deregulation, land is agriculturally intensified and diversified in the Green Belt. Green Belt policy is unable to counter these trends due to its narrow disintegrated nature.🧵(4/10)

Three diverging scenarios were created: “Intensify & Diversify”, “Build-Build-Build” and “Multifunctional” framed on a governance-functionality axis.

We used and tested #AI image generation to create fictional but typical base #GreenBelt landscapes to visualise possible changes 🧵(3/10)

#GreenBelts are more contentious than ever. As planning zones they are under scrutiny to deliver #Housing.

But as #SocialEcologicalLandscapes, wider land-use demands coverage. A cross-sector stakeholder workshop co-developed exploratory Green Belt landscape scenarios in 2044🧵(2/10)