Exploration of socio-ecological continuity project in great Geneva, toward a convergence of the territorial project of biodiversity and ecological continuities

A territorial project impelling biodiversity and socio-ecological transitions implies its renewal. The recognition of the landscape as a support of biodiversity led to the establishment of the tool of ecological continuities (ECs) within territorial planning. Paradoxically, the conceptualization and the representation of ECs are considered too reductive by science, while their implementation is already perceived as too complex by field actors. To overcome this paradox, research and practice extend this conceptualization to a socio-ecological understanding of the territory, it echoes the one towards which the territorial project tends. Beyond the maintenance of biodiversity, it is a question of considering the synergies between biodiversity and human activities as the basis of an eco-centered project. The present research contributing to these updates of the territorial project and ECs, as well as to their intertwining. It aims to develop another approach to the project of biodiversity based on the socio-ecological synergies that occur on the whole territory, assuming that the fabric of the agricultural landscape is revealing of contemporary prospective synergies. This article presents one case studies whose objective is to explore a way of overcoming the issue of ecological continuity linked to the fragmentation of the landscape, especially by mobility infrastructures. The objective is to elaborate a social-ecological continuities project which enhance each other, revitalizing the landscape as a medium for coexistence. The interweaving of landscape structures and mobility meshes changes as we move from human to wild habitats. If ‘wilderness landscape’ tend to keep humans outside, ‘urbanized landscape’ encouraging local lifestyle, weaving links between human and anthropophilic species. This exploration brings three results: 1) a conceptual approach of ecological continuities; 2) a cartographic method to analyze human and non-human continuities; 3) a prospective scenario that can be used as a basis for discussions that open other possibilities.