Abstract Summary
The Minimum Urban Units (MUUs) present a potential solution for responsive urban planning. Once implemented, MUUs can facilitate sustainable urban development and improve the quality of life of city dwellers. The MUUs are founded on the Local Climate Zone (LCZ) classification scheme, created by Oke and Stewart, and offer a way to delineate and characterise a city's physical attributes and environmental influence. The innovative element of this classification system encompasses not just land cover characteristics, building morphology and land use but also delocalised data on social aspects, demographics, urban mobility, and urban health, among others. The MUUs result from the research funded by the PNRR-Ecosystem of Innovation - Vitality, aiming to investigate the relationships between urban climatology, urban typomorphological research and social relations. For this purpose, the MUU concept identifies the most suitable smallest unit of urban development that can be efficiently planned and managed. The implementation of MUU provides a sustainable and resilient framework for urban development, which improves the restructuring of cities. A GIS-based platform helps implement the MUU concept by integrating data from multiple sources, including environmental, social, climatic, morphological, pollutant, economic, demographic and other relevant data sets. Such a platform, based on a Geographic Information System (GIS), allows urban planners to analyse and view the data spatially, which helps in identifying areas requiring attention and intervention. Additionally, this platform has the potential to facilitate engagement and collaboration among stakeholders, which is essential for successfully planning urban areas. MUU can help address the challenges of urbanisation, such as rapid population growth, environmental degradation and social inequality. Furthermore, it can foster sustainable and resilient urban development, which is crucial for the well-being of city residents and the planet. Overall, utilising a GIS-based platform and multi-source data can enhance the effectiveness of MUU and facilitate the production of adaptable urban plans. Implementing MUU in urban planning could revolutionise how cities are planned and managed, thus significantly contributing to creating sustainable and habitable urban environments. This approach can potentially enhance the effectiveness of urban planning processes and generate adaptive solutions. MUU, in fact, provides a structure for devising adaptive urban planning approaches capable of responding to the constantly changing requirements of a city. This paper outlines the critical determinants for characterising Minimum Urban Units (MUUs) as an extension of Local Climate Zones (LCZs) classification. The study aims to establish risk levels and climate scenarios for 2050-2080. The obtained information can be used to provide guidelines and regulations for the design of climate-resilient urban areas. Implementing MUUs offers promising results for urban planners looking to reorder disorganised cities.
