Redeveloping Open and Urban Green Spaces for Climate Resilience; A Case Study of Chennai

Open and Urban green spaces (UGS) are important assets of urban sustainability, provide essential ecosystem services, climate resilience and contribute to human well-being. However, planning open and UGS for climate resilience requires appropriate land use planning aided by urban policies and planning guidelines. In this chapter, we present a GIS (Geographical Information System) based framework to identify open and UGS for developing climate resilience using Chennai as a case city. Using high-resolution satellite imageries, we have identified 63 sq. km of potential land parcels that can be developed as open and UGS in Chennai city that will provide climate adaptation benefits against floods and urban heat island effect. We debate the importance of identifying and protecting open areas and UGS in urban development master plans and further discuss some of the current opportunities enabled by recent urban policies and missions such as the smart city and AMRUT mission and barriers, particularly on master planning including capacity gaps and urban governance for redeveloping urban green spaces in Indian cities for climate resilience. Highlights: