Shifting concepts of urban landscape in Helsinki: From primary forests to high tech nature-based solutions

This chapter explores diverse roles of landscape in urban planning and how it has been framed through different planning approaches in the capital of Finland. We will introduce the Kalasatama neighborhood as a case for shifting paradigms of sustainable landscape. Forest landscape played a great role in socio-political housing policies since the 1950s. They supported direct daily engagement with nature to enhance human-nature relationships. More utilitarian attitude towards nature strengthened in urban planning discourse in the 1980s. The compact city structure and enhanced energy efficiency of transport and housing manifested the ideology of sustainable city. In growing and densifying Helsinki, the role of nature transformed to be economically valuable service providers i.e. “nature-based-solutions” for cities tackling climate change. The current aim is to bring multifunctional nature back to everyone’s doorstep. This need shifts towards holistic social-ecological-technological system (SETS) thinking and collaborative planning in urban planning to support sustainable landscape in cities.