Ricerc@Sapienza

The recent news highlights that one of the most evident manifestations of climate changes on the
territory is represented by coastal flooding as a result of the combined effect of sea level rise and the
increasingly frequent and violent rainfall.
Cases such as the massive flood that hit Manhattan, following Hurricane Sandy in 2014, require a
deep reflection on how to guide the sustainable development of coastal areas in urban areas, while
at the same time managing to guarantee a quality public space.

Balancing the ecosystem service (ES) mismatch should be a goal of sustainable urban planning. However, (i)
many urban areas lack an assessment of this mismatch and (ii) scientific findings are not easily translatable into
good practices. In this study, we assessed the mismatch for two regulating ESs—regulation of air quality
(intended as PM10 removal by vegetation) and urban temperature regulation—in the Municipality of Rome
(Italy). The spatial distribution of the ES mismatch was then used to identify priority intervention areas (PIAs),