This section focuses on key planning strategies that can be used to create cities that support both biodiversity and human health. Planning strategies set the stage for site scale activities by aligning goals, identifying opportunities, and setting priorities. This alignment supports systems that work together, for both people and wildlife. These strategies can help coordinate efforts from the regional to neighborhood scale and inform the implementation of the site-based strategies discussed in the following chapters.

The first two strategies focus on process-based approaches, while the latter three relate to the spatial distribution of greening across the landscape. Typical contexts and documents in which these strategies may be relevant include: city-wide planning (ex. General Plans, Open-Space Master Plans, Urban Forest Master Plans, Biodiversity Strategies), community engagement efforts for plan and project development, city programs (ex. residential incentive programs), neighborhood planning (ex. Specific Plans).