Participative landscape planning in rural areas: A case study from Novodvorsko, Žehušicko, Czech Republic

•Four landscape development scenarios with different aims of the quality were created.•Landscape quality objective was made based on these development scenarios.•Landscape quality objective is a long-term strategic vision of landscape development.•All process was based on the participative landscape planning.

According to the European Landscape Convention, landscape quality objectives should be defined for assessed landscapes as a part of landscape policies. The pilot study for Novodvorsko and Žehušicko in Central Bohemia is focused on sustainable landscape development with regard to the economic development, but also on the protection of natural and socio-cultural landscape qualities. The aim of this study is to investigate the implementation of the European Landscape Convention at the local level. The landscape quality objective should be a long-term strategic vision for making a landscape policy that could be used as a basis for strategic landscape planning documents. First, a landscape diagnosis was proposed. Then, four different scenarios for landscape development were assessed (integration, segregation, exploitation, and abandonment scenario). Finally, a landscape quality objective was developed. All process was closely connected with participative landscape planning; local stakeholders were involved to the whole process.