Vacant urban land is the essential building block required for the implementation of a community garden. The urban sprawl offers spaces where such gardens can be created. Areas include land below electricity lines, near oil pipelines, city-owned land, or private properties. 

Cities Without Hunger makes contracts with land owners on the use of the respective area. The land is given to the NGO for free. In turn, land owners can be certain that their land is going to be used as a community garden, avoiding the misuse of areas as dumping sites, and helping prevent wilful damage of infrastructures such as electricity lines or oil pipelines. On such areas, other landuses such as housing are prohibited. That way, landuse conflicts do not occur. 

Land use contractors include e. g. the energy supplier Petrobras, Transpetro, or Eletropaulo. 

With a growing number of community gardens and strong media presence within São Paulo and beyond, Cities Without Hunger earned a reputation as an NGO with who private and public land proprietors want to collaborate. Hence, getting access to new areas is usually unproblematic. 

The first community garden was built by Mr. Temp and his brother on their own initiative on a plot of vacant urban land in front of Temp's house in São Paulo's East Zone.

Both have experience in organic agriculture: His brother runs their great-grandfather's farm in Agudo in the South of Brazil, and Temp, after having studied business management in Rio de Janeiro (1985-88), completed a two-years course in organic agriculture on a farm in Tübingen, Germany (1993-95). 

The garden area had been abused as a dumping site. When neighbours saw the garden being built there instead, they became aware of and interested in this alternative kind of landuse. A group of people got together to help and to replicate the implementation of gardens. Temp guided them.

Today, having implemented 25 community gardens, he considers guidance crucial for the success of the gardens. Furthermore, this guidance needs to be continuous and intensive especially in the first year of a garden's implementation. Afterwards, community gardeners are able to manage their garden autonomously, but it is important for Cities Without Hunger to be present as contact persons and to lend bigger machines when needed. 

Before he founded Cities Without Hunger, Hans Dieter Temp had worked as project coordinator in the city of São Paulo's public administration, supporting the creation of the Secretaria de Relações Internacionais da Prefeitura de São Paulo, the mairy's secretary for international relations. He found that the effort put into administrative tasks could do little to tackle the actual problems of local people in 

the city districts, because the city administration was lacking staff responsible for such tasks, and because residents were lacking basic prerequisites to improve their situation. He wanted to close this gap and to be present on-site as coordinator to support the local network. In December 2003 he quit his job at the city administration and began the foundation process of Cities Without Hunger.

A preparatory land use plan (PLUP) was undertaken, which organises land into its building and other types of uses and includes green areas and corridors. This PLUP is not legally binding, but serves as a basis for planning and information.

The land use plan developed in 2010 contains essential components for sustainable urban development, envisaging urban development under the slogan "urban─compact─green". Its guideline is for brownfield rather than greenfield development in a 4:1 ratio. It aims to protect green areas and develop a green network through brownfield areas.

The climate Atlas for the Stuttgart region was published in 2008 and comprises of standardised climatic assessments for 179 towns and municipalities in the Stuttgart region. It provides relevant information and maps required for urban climatic optimisation, such as regional wind patterns, air pollution concentrations, temperature, etc.

A key element of the atlas in terms of EbA planning for airflow and cooling is an area classification based on the role that different locations play in air exchange and cool airflow in the Stuttgart region. This is based on topography, development density and character, and provision of green space. The Atlas distinguishes eight categories of areas in this manner, and for each of them different planning measures and recommendations are provided.

Planning recommendations were included in the “Climate Booklet for Urban Development Online – Städtebauliche Klimafibel Online".

Field surveys were undertaken to map the extent of marine and terrestrial ecosystems, develop an ecological baseline and identify areas and measures for ecosystem-based interventions. Field surveys also identified locations of infrastructure exposed to river flooding. Remote sensing and GIS modelling provided complementary data and were used to assess exposure of the population to storm surges and flooding under current and future conditions. The InVest coastal vulnerability model was used to assess coastal exposure under different ecosystem management scenarios.

A planning and feasibility study for coastal restoration was also undertaken.

In order to establish a risk-informed and sustainable water resource management framework for the Lukaya basin, ecosystem-based measures are mainstreamed into an Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM) Action Plan. The Association of the Users of the Lukaya River Basin (AUBR/L) developed the plan with support from UNEP and an international expert and is responsible for its implementation.

The Plan outlines a series of priority actions under four main pillars: water, environment, land use planning and governance. An integral component of the Action Plan is promoting sustainable ecosystem management approaches within the overarching framework of IWRM.

Development of the IWRM Action Plan emphasized the importance of linking upstream and downstream communities and strengthening their knowledge of the geographic and socio-economic conditions within their shared river basin. 3D participatory mapping was used to map hazards, land use types, natural resources and identify major environmental problems and areas at risk in the basin, through a multi-stakeholder, participatory approach.

Furthermore soil erosion and hydro-meteorological monitoring was put in place to allow for flood risk modelling. This would establish baselines and provide data to inform IWRM planning.

The project designed a Green and Resilient Development Planning template to be used at the village level, and proposed a model to scale up local planning to integrate ecosystem and disaster to the landscape level. Community-based mapping, GIS modelling and remote sensing assessments were undertaken to better understand the current and historical changes in disaster risk, ecosystem health and land use, while taking climate change into account. A visioning assessment with the local community was also conducted to better understand the community’s development needs.

 In the template, the planning process starts with a thorough examination of existing physical, social, cultural, religious, and socio-economic conditions, as well as identifying and locating key hazards and disaster prone areas through community consultations, field visits, and local expert knowledge. Once the information is collected, communities are encouraged to discuss and identify local development priorities with respect to livelihoods, village development, disaster prevention and improving community resilience. A village development map, accompanied by a short report explaining the findings, development goals and strategies make up the final plan.

The workshop must be carefully planned well in advance to allow for those with jobs, school, or household duties to attend their prioritized needs. A critical component of success is the participatory feature of this workshop, and to make this workshop fully participatory, there must be a coordinator and personnel duties fully established

The technical aspects of the table/model must be carefully planned by a GIS specialist. Key considerations include: intent of model, vulnerable natural and social resources, land elevation, land area, marine and water features, space to host the model, and access to model materials.

The spatial extent and the elevation of the land will inform the GIS specialist of the scale to be used. The scale impacts the number of foam layers to be used, and ultimately the amount of foam material needed to create the model. Experience with topographic maps and geospatial analysis is required.