Urban ecology within multidisciplinary educative framework

Mirela Sertić Perić¹, Bojana Bojanić Obad Šćitaroci², Tamara Zaninović², Ana Sopina², Vesna Gulin Beljak¹

¹University of Zagreb, Faculty of Science, Croatia

²University of Zagreb, Faculty of Architecture, Croatia

mirela.sertic.peric@biol.pmf.hr

Education for sustainable development

Abstract

Cities are complex ecosystems and habitats for more than half of world’s population. The aim of this work is to present how students and professors from two faculties within the University of Zagreb work together to investigate case studies of urban parks as places for all living beings. The research projects developed by the students combine knowledge and methods from both the Faculty of Science (Department of Biology) and the Faculty of Architecture (Department of Urban Planning, Spatial Planning and Landscape Architecture). Students select a site where they develop a project proposal as part of their intervention theme to improve life in the neighbouring communities, considering the impact on biodiversity, activities, landscaping, and public space quality. The work compares the urban design approach of the architecture students with the biodiversity approach of the biology students using the case studies of Park Mladenaca, Park Kajzerica and Dugave Park in New Zagreb. These case studies were a part of series of parallel workshop and seminar assignments during three academic years from 2021 to 2024. The results show that a multidisciplinary approach is an important step in understanding and planning sustainable urban transformations in open public spaces. The educative experience of cooperation between the Faculty of Science and the Faculty of Architecture is a successful example of education framework within sustainable development goals. As such, it is also an invitation to a broader discourse on exploring students’ assignments from different perspectives, in the hope that the multidisciplinary approach will become inter- and transdisciplinary in the future.

Key words

biodiversity; landscape architecture; urban design; urban parks; Zagreb