Ensuring a sustainable future and a better quality of life for all. These are the biggest challenges that cities and regions are called to face in the next decade. While the European Union encourages urban planners, architects, researchers, and the civil society to join forces and shape “more beautiful, sustainable and inclusive forms of living together”, governments all around the world are looking for solutions to turn urban areas into greener and more digital places, resilient to the threats of pandemics, climate change effects, and socio-political tensions.
The goal of this Research Topic is to combine the latest theory and modeling results with real-world experiences by not only focusing on best practices, but reporting and learning also from failures, key success factors, and possible solutions to cope with unexpected risks and threats, and recent advances in the "phygital (physical and digital)" evolution of our settlements, cities, and regions.
This Research Topic seeks to collect studies investigating the impact of local, national, and international research and innovation projects in cities and regions, aiming to solve current societal, environmental-energy, and economic challenges. Studies that include lighthouse demonstration cases are encouraged, as well as those conducted by multidisciplinary teams integrating and analyzing the results from a holistic perspective, considering sustainability criteria such as ESG and SDG goals.
We also encourage the submission of studies that have been preliminary presented and discussed at the 4th edition of the international conference
Smart and Sustainable Planning for Cities and Regions - SSPCR 2022 (18-22 July, Bolzano/Bozen - Italy), covering topics including:
• The role of the climate-neutral city;
• The potential benefits of urban transformations;
• Tackling environmental sustainability in cities and regions;
• Strengthening democracy in the energy transition;
• Policymaking for smart and sustainable regions;
• Agile planning for ever-changing mobility;
• Internet of cities - from data to knowledge.
