Climate and landscape in mutual transformation

The natural landscape is the result of a delicate balance established over geological time between different natural processes at work on the surface and within our Planet. The different forcing factors interact, limiting or enhancing each other in a ‘dynamic’ equilibrium. Atmosphere and hydrosphere come into contacts with rocks and minerals at the Earth's surface, where processes of rock adaptation to external conditions occur spontaneously. The surface of our Planet is constantly evolving and changing over time, forming landscapes. The elements that characterize a landscape are manifold and include soil, surface water, fauna, vegetation and climate. Over the last two million years, Man, with his presence and activities (e.g. cities, roads, infrastructure, etc.) has modified the natural landscape and its evolution, often imposing himself on other factors. Examples are areas desertified as a result of deforestation and fires and not caused by climatic aridity, or artificially snow-covered areas where in nature the snow mantle would not persist until spring and would not allow skiing, but human action imposes itself on the climate and creates skiable areas up to low altitudes. In man-made landscapes, where human action is intense, it is often difficult to distinguish cause from effect and the work of the geographer and landscape planner is complex. On the one hand, residual elements of the natural landscape must be identified and, if possible, preserved and enhanced. On the other hand, the sustainability of the man-made landscape and its forms must be carefully assessed in order to decide whether to maintain them or restore previous conditions. Among the different situations that the geographer may encounter, two extremes that we want to analyze in this contribution are: 1) totally natural areas that are indirectly modified by man; 2) totally man-made areas that are modified in parallel with human socio-economic evolution and that impact on other natural resources such as the climate. For the first category of landscapes, it was decided in this paper to focus attention on glaciated high-altitude areas. These areas, even when natural and potentially without direct human impacts, are affected indirectly, that is, by climate change. The climate change taking place in this historical period is predominantly a consequence of human action, and the environmental repercussions of warming therefore represent indirect effects of human activity. For the second category, urban landscapes, which are totally consequential to human design and planning, will be analyzed. The City represents the main product of human action on the land, and its geometry, evolution and dynamics respond to complicated socio-economic and cultural dynamics. The City and its evolution directly impact not only internal and surrounding natural areas but also a widespread resource such as the atmosphere and climate. The example of the urban heat island (UHI) is perhaps one of the most obvious and will be addressed in this paper.