Increasing ecosystem resilience through landscape interventions
Author: Eranda Janku
Affiliation: Polis University
Abstract
With pressure coming from an uncontrolled urbanization process, which in most of the cases has been unplanned and compromising natural potentials, and with little awareness regarding the importance of understanding and respecting the natural features beyond just individual interests, the case of flooding in Shkodra makes for a perfect example, on how an ecosystem can react when reaching a critical point of change, which affects its ability to regenerate. Managing a healthy relationship between urban-rural-and natural is very important, and given the constant flooding challenges that Shkodra faces with every year, learning how to manage and live with water, becomes the key to increasing the resilience of the whole regional ecosystem. Having set the background of the big picture, this paper tries to analyze the case of flooding in Shkodra, by understanding first the natural and artificial processes happening, and then coming in practice with a series of proposals of landscape interventions, aiming to improve ecosystem resilience. The confluence of Buna, Kiri and Drini River, and the surrounding agricultural and urban environment become subject of illustration, previewing how on different emergency scenarios, the whole ecosystem can adapt and sustain itself.
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