River zones as a tool for increasing the urban sustainability in large cities of Russia

Abstract

This work studies the main parameters of the major river zones in ten large cities in Russia in terms of their potential to form a blue-green corridor and its efficiency and integrity, which are essential for creating a more sustainable urban environment. We used several indicators to evaluate these aspects, like the green infrastructure availability of river zones, vegetation fragmentation, intactness of the unsealed 200-m riverside line and a functional structure of river zones. The integrated assessment revealed that river zones actually form a blue-green corridors only in two cities, Omsk and Krasnoyarsk. These two blue-green corridors, as well as the potential corridors of Nizhny Novgorod, Ufa and Irkutsk, can be considered the most effective ones. On the contrary, in Kazan, Rostov-on- Don and Khabarovsk, river zones least of all resemble corridors. In the remaining cities, river zones have an insignificantly fragmented vegetation, so they can be probably turned into blue-green corridors if numerous former industrial zones along the river will be transformed into new green elements, and if the existing infrastructure will get more vegetation.