The RHS is calling for the provision of gardens to be central to UK housebuilding targets as it hosts more than 70 green infrastructure experts from around the world and housing crisis solutions are discussed at the Labour Party Conference this week.

With more than four fifths of the UK population living in urban areas, ensuring the creation and maintenance of domestic and shared gardens are fundamental in building resilient communities says the charity.

Gardens and the cultivated plants within them offer nature-based solutions for climate adaptation and mitigation such as slowing the flow of rainwater, cooling and pollution capture, provide an all important home for wildlife and promote good health and wellbeing via food growing, promotion of physical activity and social engagement.

However, while developers are currently required to increase a site’s biodiversity provision by 10%, the measure of success – the Biodiversity Net Gain 4.0 metric - does not account for gardens nor the estimated 400,000 cultivated plant varieties thought to be found within them, overlooking them as an important tool in tackling environmental and social problems.

The RHS is calling for a review of the Biodiversity Net Gain 4.0 metric, updated planning guidelines to require cultivated landscapes, and garden masterplans for urban areas. Crucially these gardens or planted spaces might take on new and creative forms.

RHS Garden Wisley will host the III International Symposium on Greener Cities: Improving Ecosystem Services in a Climate-Changing World (GreenCities2024) from 25th-28th September under the aegis of the International Society for Horticultural Science (ISHS), where the latest research on urban greening will be discussed and global examples of success shared. These include:

• The shoehorning in of gardens where space is lacking to strengthen urban resilience such as in Athens where disused railway lines, bridges and stations are being used to help mitigate the urban heat island effect and provide important corridors for the movement of pollinators.
• The development of rooftop greenhouses on commercial high rises in Seoul for urban farming and which also reduce greenhouse gas emissions via the exchange of energy between office and growing space.
• The installation of new green walls as part of the re-development of Turin which helped in providing all important eco-system services in a dense urban environment, including pollution capture, and showed that minimal urban greening interventions have a substantial impact on citizens’ well-being.

RHS own research too has been - and is - demonstrating what plants can help future proof towns and cities, including identifying the role of hedges in improving air quality, what garden trees will withstand and service needs in a changing climate, how water can be managed and retained in gardens and the science of green behaviours.

Alistair Griffiths, Director of Science and Collections at the RHS, said: “With plans for a once in a generation housebuilding spree, it is time for a collaborative and coordinated strategy that puts gardens and cultivated green spaces at the heart of our communities, leveraging their numerous benefits for many more people and providing space for active and not simply passive engagement with nature.”

For more information about the ISHS III International Symposium on Greener Cities: Improving Ecosystem Services in a Climate-Changing World at RHS Garden Wisley, 25th-28th September visit: Greener Cities 2024 - International Symposium / RHS