Protecting the natural environment

Published on 17 October 2016 - Updated 16 December 2019

The Loire Valley is home to a wide variety of natural environments – stream-cut fluvial rock platforms, gravel pits, marshland, watercourses, forests, sand banks, peat bogs, ponds and lakes and open environments. How can these environments be protected? How can their protection be factored into territorial planning strategies or development projects?

To know...

  • Le Schéma régional de cohérence écologique (SRCE) fixe, à l’échelle régionale, les objectifs de continuité écologique et les plans d’actions stratégiques.
  • La préservation des milieux passe notamment par la protection et le renforcement des « corridors écologiques » ou réseaux d’échanges sur le territoire, afin que les espèces animales et végétales puissent communiquer, circuler, s’alimenter, se reproduire ou se reposer.
  • Le Plan Local d’Urbanisme (PLU) fixe réglementairement les limites de consommation d’espace et détermine l’emprise sur les milieux naturels.
  • Le dispositif Natura 2000 offre des outils opérationnels pour la protection des espèces sauvage, animales ou végétales, et de leurs habitats.

100%  

of spatial planning and sustainable development projects (PADDs) 

set the statutory 

land take limits. 

Link experiences

The Lower Valleys of the Vienne and Indre

Floodplains, wooded farmland, poplar tree plantations, cropland, alluvial aff...

Read more

How to ?

Preservation of natural environments first and foremost requires knowledge of and compliance with the main regional and national guidelines as well as development of a holistic spatial planning approach which incorporates this issue.  

Become familiar with baseline documents and existing schemes

See the tools and methods

Define the priorities and aims

  • Identify the local issues in terms of ecological continuity through maintenance of green and blue infrastructure, in keeping with the SRCE guidelines
  • Define aims in terms of encroachment on natural environments

Set out these aims in development projects and strategies

  • Produce recommendations in terms of:
    • urban planning,
    • farmland cover,
    • development and take of the river and natural environments,
    • structures for limiting the river's reach over the territory,
    • production of sand and alluvial aggregate
  • Take these recommendations on board in urban planning documents or urban development projects.

Harness the communication tools to promote the approach