SEMEUR

Capacity of land transport infrastructures to meet the demand for Ecosystem Services in the Urban Environment  - Methodological framework and experimental site in the territory of Saint-Fons (Grand Lyon)

In France, more than 80% of the population lives in cities and this is increasing year by year. The urban environment therefore concentrates demand for many urban ecosystem services (regulation of the local climate, water management, cultural services, biodiversity, support for food crops) while having a limited supply, in particular linked to the rate of artificialization of soils.

Land transport infrastructures (ILTe) are key elements of the urban landscape: railways, urban highways, electricity transport and even river transport. These infrastructures present both substantial footprints and a significant level of artificialization.
The objective of the SEMEUR project is to develop a methodology for assessing the demand for ecosystem services in an urban area and to evaluate the capacity of ILTe to meet this demand and to contribute to the ecological restoration of urban forests and revegetation of the city.

The study area of SEMEUR project is the municipality of Saint-Fons (+ a 0.5-1 km buffer) in the metropolis of Lyon. Saint-Fons is one of the municipalities with the greatest deficit in the metropolis in terms of trees and is a priority area for revegetation operations and the deployment of the Plan Canopée. In addition, the municipality of Saint-Fons has a wide variety of land transport infrastructure (roads, highways, railways, waterways, high voltage lines and hydrocarbon transport pipelines). The SEMEUR project considers the following ILTe: road, rail, tram, underground and overhead (water, electricity, gas) and river networks.

The project will participate in the Plan Canopée of the Lyon metropolis. This Plan is the operational version of the Tree Charter, a territorial partnership mechanism associating more than 120 public, private and associative stakeholders in the Lyon metropolis.