Abstract: “Leaving space for wildness” as a critical initiative for maintaining biodiversity within national territorial space, holds significant importance in supporting the construction of ecologically sustainable and high-quality metropolitan regions. However, current metropolitan planning systems have not sufficiently addressed this issue, and it is particularly crucial to emphasize this aspect in the advancement of the ecological civilization system. This study adopts a historical perspective to examine the development of various types of natural ecological spaces in Chinese metropolitan areas over the past 30 years, focusing on both the overall metropolitan region and the urban core. It analyzes the increasingly prominent coexistence pattern between natural protected areas and built-up areas across metropolitan regions, as well as the evolution in core urban areas from emphasizing the coordinated expansion of green spaces and built-up areas to the focused development of large suburban parks that incorporate ecological conservation zones. These findings collectively reveal the gradually strengthening trend of natural wilderness preservation in contemporary metropolitan areas. Furthermore, the study explores and envisions metropolitan planning under the framework of the ecological civilization system, addressing aspects such as conceptual adjustments, system development, and mechanism optimization. It advocates for the exploration of systematic space for wildness within metropolitan planning frameworks, promoting the development of relevant governance tools to support the future emergence of a new metropolitan form characterized by “urban-wilderness coexistence.”

Key words: leaving space for wildness, metropolitan region, biodiversity, human settlements