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Sustainable Cities in the Pandemic Era: Rethinking Transportation, Land Use, and Health

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050). This special issue belongs to the section "Sustainable Transportation".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 January 2022) | Viewed by 11210

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Sumeeta Srinivasan

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning, Tufts University, Medford, MA 02155, USA
Interests: transportation; health; spatial models; geographic information systems
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. ChengHe Guan

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
1. Urban Science and Policy, New York University Shanghai, Shanghai 200122, China
2. University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 2JD, UK
Interests: urban computation and analytics; low-carbon city; spatial computation and urban growth modelling
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The current COVID-19 pandemic may be a glimpse into our future as biodiversity loss exposes human beings to animal-borne diseases more rapidly. As countries and cities react to COVID-19, they face unexpected challenges in economic development, inequity of access, and loss of livelihoods. For example, many cities depend on tourism and hospitality services to generate employment. These may no longer be viable when all travel is restricted between and within cities, states, and countries. Many cities also face challenges in housing, transit services, and inequities in food distribution as residents become unemployed or underemployed. Many urban residents are vulnerable to poor health outcomes due to both their frontline jobs and their lack of transportation and housing choices.

This Special Issue entitled “Sustainable Cities in the Pandemic Era: Rethinking Transportation, Land Use, and Health” will approach a wide range of topics that will help readers to understand the impact of the current and future impact of pandemics on cities. This Special Issue welcomes papers on the likely effects of the pandemic on transportation, land use, and infrastructure planning. Papers examining inequities within cities in housing, transportation, food, and health access due to the pandemic are also welcome. Contributions related to the future of food systems, infrastructure, and land use planning will also be useful. Papers examining the ways in which cities evolve to meet sustainability goals in the context of the pandemic are especially welcome. Papers looking at the data and methodology challenges in addressing policy and planning for pandemic-affected cities would also help to round out the issue. We also invite papers that outline the processes related to the interdisciplinary collaboration necessary for planning for sustainable cities in this new era. These papers may represent case studies from any part of the world, but the challenges of the Global South would be especially welcome.

Dr. Sumeeta Srinivasan
Dr. ChengHe Guan
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • transportation
  • land use
  • urban planning
  • sustainable cities
  • food systems
  • equity
  • housing
  • public health
  • climate change
  • data; mobility
  • pandemic

Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

17 pages, 3809 KiB  
Article
The Effect of the Built Environment on the COVID-19 Pandemic at the Initial Stage: A County-Level Study of the USA
by Chenghe Guan, Junjie Tan, Brian Hall, Chao Liu, Ying Li and Zhichang Cai
Sustainability 2022, 14(6), 3417; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14063417 - 15 Mar 2022
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2212
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic affected how people interact with the built environment and ways of human habitation are facing significant challenges. However, the existing literature has not adequately addressed how the built environment affected the early prevalence of the pandemic. This research aims to [...] Read more.
The COVID-19 pandemic affected how people interact with the built environment and ways of human habitation are facing significant challenges. However, the existing literature has not adequately addressed how the built environment affected the early prevalence of the pandemic. This research aims to extend the existing literature by relating the initial stage pandemic conditions with more comprehensive measures of the built environment including density, diversity, road network, and accessibility at the county level across the United States and conducting bi-weekly comparisons. We collected infection, death, and mortality data in 3141 counties between 1 March to 8 June 2020 and collected seventeen built environment attributes. Our results show that: (1) Road density and street intersection density were significantly associated with the infection rate; (2) Population density only maintained a positive correlation to the prevalence of COVID-19 during the first two weeks, after which the relationship became negative; and (3) Transit accessibility also contributed significantly to the pandemic and the accessibility of transit-oriented jobs was highly correlated to the infection rate in the first two weeks. The study provides valuable insights for policymakers and stakeholders to adopt resource allocation strategies for context-specific conditions. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Cities in the Pandemic Era: Rethinking Transportation, Land Use, and Health)
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22 pages, 1933 KiB  
Article
The Outbreak of COVID-19 Pandemic in Relation to Sense of Safety and Mobility Changes in Public Transport Using the Example of Warsaw
by Zuzanna Kłos-Adamkiewicz and Piotr Gutowski
Sustainability 2022, 14(3), 1780; https://doi.org/10.3390/su14031780 - 04 Feb 2022
Cited by 28 | Viewed by 2713
Abstract
Worldwide, many different actions have been taken by local and national governments to control the spread of COVID-19. The impact of these measures can be seen in different areas, especially in passenger transport and travel behaviour. This study examines the changes that have [...] Read more.
Worldwide, many different actions have been taken by local and national governments to control the spread of COVID-19. The impact of these measures can be seen in different areas, especially in passenger transport and travel behaviour. This study examines the changes that have occurred in travel behaviour, using the example of the capital city of Warsaw, Poland, in relation to measures undertaken to control the spread of COVID-19 and the sense of safety among passengers that was supposed to be provided by public transport organisers. Data were collected through an online survey questionnaire that included questions about past (before COVID-19) and present (during COVID-19) travel behaviour, mode choice and the frequency of trips by public transport users in Warsaw. The results showed significant changes in mobility and travel behaviour along with most common threats seen by public transport users. There was a major shift from public to individual modes of transport in the city area. The outcomes of this study could play a significant role in transport planning in the case of any other situation that affects public transport on such a level as the COVID-19 pandemic has. In particular, local and national authorities could use this knowledge for better planning for any type of lockdowns. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Cities in the Pandemic Era: Rethinking Transportation, Land Use, and Health)
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14 pages, 314 KiB  
Article
Mental Health and the City in the Post-COVID-19 Era
by Jakub S. Bil, Bartłomiej Buława and Jakub Świerzawski
Sustainability 2021, 13(14), 7533; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13147533 - 06 Jul 2021
Cited by 19 | Viewed by 5308
Abstract
The article describes the risks for the mental health and wellbeing of urban-dwellers in relation to changes in the spatial structure of a city that could be caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A year of lockdown has changed the way of life in [...] Read more.
The article describes the risks for the mental health and wellbeing of urban-dwellers in relation to changes in the spatial structure of a city that could be caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. A year of lockdown has changed the way of life in the city and negated its principal function as a place of various meetings and social interactions. The danger of long-term isolation and being cut-off from an urban lifestyle is not only a challenge facing individuals, but it also creates threats on various collective levels. Hindered interpersonal relations, stress, and the fear of another person lower the quality of life and may contribute to the development of mental diseases. Out of fear against coronavirus, part of the society has sought safety by moving out of the densely populated city centres. The dangerous results of these phenomena are shown by research based on the newest literature regarding the influence of COVID-19 and the lockdown on mental health, urban planning, and the long-term spatial effects of the pandemic such as the urban sprawl. The breakdown of the spatial structure, the loosening of the urban tissue, and urban sprawl are going to increase anthropopressure, inhibit access to mental health treatment, and will even further contribute to the isolation of part of the society. In addition, research has shown that urban structure loosening as a kind of distancing is not an effective method in the fight against the SARS-COV pandemic. Creating dense and effective cities through the appropriate management of development during and after the pandemic may be a key element that will facilitate the prevention of mental health deterioration and wellbeing. It is also the only possibility to achieve the selected Sustainable Development Goals, which as of today are under threat. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Sustainable Cities in the Pandemic Era: Rethinking Transportation, Land Use, and Health)
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