Over several centuries, the native vegetation of the flat part of the Bogotá Savanna has been almost completely replaced by crops, pastures and urbanization. The last remnant of this vegetation is a small forest (10 hm²), located at Hacienda Las Mercedes on the northern edge of the city of Bogotá. The reduced size and isolation of the forest, aggravated by the uncontrolled growth of invasive vegetation (lianas and wild blackberry) has resulted in the loss of many species. However, in recent years the forest has been subject to rehabilitation actions and currently the area is immersed in a reserve where more extensive restoration programs are planned. In order to evaluate changes in the bird community to estimate the effects of restoration actions, the avifauna present in 2001–2002 and in 2014 was recorded by visual and auditory records at fixed points in the forest. Twenty-seven forest species were found in the first census and 30 in the second, and the relative abundances of at least a third of them also increased over the 13 years, indicating a positive result in the recovery of the forest. The results highlight the recovery capacity of the degraded ecosystems and the importance of continuing with restoration actions in the reserve area.

The urban fringe – the zone lying between urban areas and the countryside, - offers valuable opportunities for commercial and residential development as well as for recreational activities, but it is often characterised by a number of land use problems and environmental conflicts. Within the UK, the urban fringe can be seen as a contested and dynamic space, yet for almost 70 years statutory town planning policies for the urban fringe have been largely concerned with containment designed to stop urban encroachment into the countryside. However, in 1970s a number of experimental urban fringe management projects were established around town and cities within the UK, culminating in the creation of the Groundwork projects, and here the focus was on a wider and more flexible approach, and more specifically on providing a range of opportunities for recreation, and to attempt to reconcile environmental conflicts. This paper explores the evolution of Groundwork, and more specifically focuses on two Research Questions namely, what was the initial rationale and aims of Groundwork? and secondly what is its current focus and future direction?