Green Corridors as a response for nature: greening Alexandria city by creating a green infrastructure network

摘要

Green Corridors are an essential component of the cities' ecological networks; they are a strong response to environmental problems. They have a dual purpose. In addition to their ecological role in creating a pure vision, and helping people to live in better communities, they provide access routes, and improve the quality of life, particularly social life. Therefore, they should be viewed as part of the overall network of habitats throughout the city. Green Corridors' designs produce a subsidiary network of greenways to actualize and complete the green infrastructure framework. Alexandria city, Egypt, has many of those corridors, which give a good opportunity to create local Green Networks of high quality. The development of Mahmoudeya Canal, which is the main Green Corridor in Alexandria, may be the main axis to increase the number of open spaces, and to create an attractive urban environment. This paper aims to apply such corridors to unify and actively connect all parts within the city's fabric and beyond. This will create new channels for population-distribution, provide more economic opportunities and increase the potential value of land potential. It will also present a conceptual design for a Green Network inside the urban form of Alexandria city. Main nodes at the existing canal will be created as the central pivots to run the Green Network into the different parts of the city, and form many areas encircled by greenways. Thus, it will ease the development procedures of these areas to have adaptive green areas and enhance their environmental context. The paper concludes that Green Corridors have a pivotal role in increasing environmental quality, so planners and decisions makers should incorporate Green Networks in the urban form of the new communities, and plan to develop the existing corridors through good management and maintenance.