In an era marked by renewed environmental sensitivity following the European Landscape Convention (2000), urbanism must integrate environmental context and the sense of place, thus demanding systematic perceptual‑landscape tools to guide territorial and urban governance. This study advocates for a holistic perceptual analysis of peri‑urban transition zones—spaces where administrative boundaries blur and inhabitants experience a seamless landscape. Using Madrid as a laboratory, the author employs a dual methodology: the technical gaze, grounded in historical, cartographic, photographic and 3D visual‑catchment modelling alongside analytical drawings, and the everyday gaze, illuminated via semi‑structured interviews and participant‑drawings analysed through NVIVO’s open, axial and selective coding into hierarchical nodes. Findings reveal that the urban green infrastructure (UGI) network—comprising interlinked green spaces—acts as both a buffer against unchecked urbanisation and a generator of urban character, fostering connectivity, multifunctionality, accessibility, belonging, identity and well‑being. Metropolitan parks in Madrid’s periphery emerge as urban thresholds that enhance territorial cohesion and reinforce landscape legibility, offering a design strategy for integrating green and grey infrastructure to reduce environmental impact. These graphical and qualitative tools, resource‑light yet methodologically robust, are transferable to planning and management frameworks beyond Madrid, supporting strategies to cultivate resilient green networks that reinforce cultural‑environmental values, territorial coherence and the image of the city perceived by its users (Santo‑Tomas Muro, 2021). Thus, the interplay between perception, infrastructure, and identity invites urban design and policy to embrace green infrastructure not merely as ecological remedy but as a lived, meaningful landscape framework that shapes sustainable urban futures.
Santo-Tomas Muro, R., 2021. La infraestructura verde urbana en Madrid. Técnicas de análisis perceptivo del paisaje en el contorno de la ciudad. Universidad CEU San Pablo, Madrid.
