Connection to nature and time spent in gardens predicts social cohesion

A person’s health and wellbeing are contingent on the amount of social support that they receive. Similarly, experiencing nature has been shown to improve people’s health and wellbeing. However, we do not know how relationships between social cohesion, nature experiences and nature connection could interrelate and vary across different types of urban green spaces, and in non-Westernised cultures. We conducted a study on 1249 residents in Singapore, a tropical city-state, and measured three dimensions of social cohesion (i.e. general social cohesion; trust and sense of community; and social interactions), various types of nature experiences (i.e. amount of green space around one’s residence; frequency and duration of urban green space visits; frequency and duration of visits to gardens), and three dimensions of one’s connection to nature: self-identity with nature, desire to experience nature, and environmental concern (using the nature relatedness scale). We found that people who strongly identify with nature, who enjoy being in nature, and who had more frequent gardens visits were more likely to have a stronger sense of social cohesion across two dimensions. However, those with stronger environmental concern reported an overall weaker sense of social cohesion, possibly due to the perception that society’s contributions to conserve environmental problems was insufficient. Further, people who gardened more frequently were also more likely to visit green spaces, self-identify with nature and exhibit a stronger desire to experience nature. We propose that strategies targeted at encouraging people to engage in nature-related, collaborative activities at the local community level, such as spending time in local gardens, will increase urban residents’ daily nature experiences and its associated benefits such as improving social cohesion.     

“A living street and not just green”: Exploring public preferences and concerns regarding nature-based solution implementation in urban streetscapes

Leveraging the benefits offered by nature-based solutions (NBS) will be vital in addressing present and future environmental and social challenges as urban densification continues to exert pressure on cities. The greening of urban streets, in particular, provides many benefits in terms of livability, health, and biodiversity. While many studies have explored the suitability of NBS in a particular context considering the benefits they provide in relation to local environmental challenges (e.g. filtering the air in areas with high pollution, absorbing water in areas prone to flooding), this study focuses on residents’ perspectives on and their demand for NBS. This is particularly relevant given the importance of public acceptance of NBS measures for their success. The research presented in this paper is based on a mixed-methods study, combining an online survey and eight focus group interviews, which aimed to better understand which types of NBS people prefer, how much and what types of street space they are willing to exchange for street greening, and the opportunities and concerns they have regarding varying degrees of street greening. Findings suggest that respondents are overwhelmingly in favor of greening their street with NBS, yet preferred NBS and opinions on where to implement them vary among participants. Further, street greening was thought to come up against other understandings of how streets should be used and for what purpose. These considerations should be taken up by planners to improve the uptake of NBS.     

Atlanta households’ willingness to increase urban forests to mitigate climate change

Investments in urban forests have been increasing in many US cities. Urban forests have been shown to provide countless ecosystem benefits with many addressing climate change issues, such as sequestering carbon, reducing air pollution, and decreasing the heat island effect. Individual groups within the American public may not respond to the issue of climate change in the same way, thus engaging each group in climate change solutions will require different approaches. It is therefore important to understand how the public perceives climate change, their values and preferences, and barriers that might constrain their engagement to policy solutions. A mail survey was implemented, focused on households’ willingness to support and pay for urban forests as a climate change mitigation method. Atlanta, Georgia, USA was selected for this study given its environmental issues such as heat island effect and land cover changes, including conversion of forestland, that come with rapid population growth and urban sprawl. A Tobit model was used to model willingness-to-pay as a function of several variables derived from survey results; and a multivariate weighting strategy was used to address nonresponse issues. The analysis showed that Atlanta households are willing to pay $1.05 million to $1.22 million per year, or $5.24 to $6.11 million over a five-year period. The WTP amount was significantly related with the residents’ income, media source from where they received climate information, and the relative coverage of tree canopy around their residence. Results are relevant to city managers who are interested in understanding the public value of urban greening programs and developing strategies or policies to expand urban forests as part of a climate change strategy.     

Nature orientation and opportunity: Who values and who has opportunity for satisfactory green spaces in proximity to their place of residence

Urban green spaces (UGS) provide important contributions to people. Yet, UGS planning requires better understanding of by whom and where such contributions are being valued or missed. Based on a mixed-methods online survey and choice experiment with residents of Wellington in Aotearoa New Zealand, we analyse how much and why residents value UGS and their benefits when deciding where to live and how socio-economic and spatial factors might impact nature orientation and opportunity for satisfactory local UGS. We find that local UGS are an important residential choice criteria for the majority of respondents, especially in the context of Wellington’s intensification plans. However, we show that socio-economic and spatial factors significantly impact whether someone values and is satisfied with UGS in proximity to their place of residence. Our findings call for careful scoping of a city’s population and spatial structure when planning for equitable UGS provision. More holistic approaches to green space planning are needed to address contextualities and the complex interdependencies between nature orientation and opportunity and to plan for green space distributions that provide opportunities now and help shaping nature orientation for future generations.     

A novel index for assessing perceived availability and public demand for urban green space: Application in a Mediterranean island

The objective benefits that humans derive from natural ecosystems and their enduring manifestation in urban green spaces (UGS) is well-know. Nevertheless, citizens’ preference, and perceived necessity of UGS is not always evident and therefore often not accounted for, especially in the context of urban planning decisions, where it could positively influence the effectiveness of greening strategies. This information is especially important in the Mediterranean islands, due to their unique character. Here we address these aspects, including the way they are affected by UGS perceived adequacy, accessibility, maintenance, distance, and other self-reported obstacles using a questionnaire completed by 703 residents of the Island of Crete, Greece. To integrate results, main covariates are compiled into the newly developed public UGS approval index. Survey results show that, 87.82 % of the participants consider public UGS highly necessary for their wellbeing, while only 69.22 % consider private UGS equally necessary. Nevertheless, private UGS were the most frequently visited green at 16.3 ± 0.7 days/month. Public UGS is considered more necessary for female respondents, under 35 years, living in an apartment in the city. However, it emerged that despite the significantly higher need for public UGS in the urban centers of the island, residents consider UGS inadequate and often inaccessible for people with mobility problems. Integration of the results in the new approval index, shows that citizens of Crete, are on average neutral or disapprove of local public UGS. The outcomes can be used for targeted interventions at existing and strategic planning in new UGS.     

Natural or artificial? Exploring perceived restoration potential of community parks in Winter city

Urban community parks, as widely distributed and frequently used small public urban green spaces, play an essential role in meeting the growing needs of residents for recovery. However, previous studies focus on the restorative benefits of nature and have rarely measured the restoration of winter scenes and artificial scenes. This paper selects a typical small community park in the winter city of China and studies how landscape elements affect restorative benefits through the setting of seasonal virtual scenes. Respondents were asked to rate natural, dynamic and seasonal virtual scenes in terms of sense of being away, extent, fascination, compatibility, and restorative potential. The results show plants with rich layers and large coverage areas have a significant positive impact on human perception of recovery, vitality facilities have no significant impact on perceived recovery, and the number of active people has a significant negative impact on perceived recovery. The plant landscape in winter and summer has the same effect on attention recovery, and seasonally induced changes in plant vision can enhance restorative benefits.     

Demographic and spatial variables associated with spending time in nature during COVID-19 lockdowns

To stop the spread of SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus (COVID-19) governments around the world implemented lockdowns restricting public travel. In the Australian state of Victoria, this included limiting permitted reasons for leaving home and restricting movements to within a 5 km radius of one’s home. In 2020, we conducted a state-wide survey (N = 1024) of Victorians that coincided with a lockdown. We asked respondents where they had spent time in nature and how they perceived lockdowns affected the amount of time they spent in nature. We then considered demographic and spatial predictors of spending more or less time in nature. Women, younger people, and those living in areas with higher socio-economic status were likely to report spending more time in nature. Closer proximity of residents to parks and waterways and higher proportional area of native vegetation within a 1-km radius were also associated with more time in nature. Understanding how different groups were affected by restrictions on access to nature can help improve government management of crises like pandemics, including through urban planning for green space, supporting improved individual and societal resilience. We discuss the implications of our findings for improving access to nature during lockdowns as well as opportunities for a post-pandemic relationship with nature, particularly in urban settings.     

Envisioning the future—Creating sustainable,healthy and resilient BioCities

Numerous challenges – from population increase to climate change – threaten the sustainable development of cities and call for a fundamental change of urban development and green-blue resource management. Urban forests are vital in this transition, as they provide various ecosystem services and allow to re-shape and re-think cities. Based on a Europe-wide community effort with diverse experts centered around urban forests and urban greening, we propose five key research fields to generate the knowledge required to unlock fundamental changes in urban development and green-blue resource management: circular bioeconomy, climate resilience, governance, social and human environment, and biodiversity. To support the design of greener, cooler, more inclusive and resilient cities, all these research fields require inter- and transdisciplinary collaboration, engaging stakeholders in transforming urban engagement and functioning. We summarise main inter-, trans- und multi-disciplinary research paths for each field and the cross-cutting knowledge areas that can help to address the challenges many cities face (e.g., modelling and assessment of the urban microclimate). For transforming cities further knowledge is needed on e.g., urban innovation, transition, participation, and more. Finally, we address how the identified research gaps can be implemented (e.g., international coordinated research effort, interdisciplinary networks).     

Urban wild food foraging locations: Understanding selection criteria to inform green space planning and management

Urban wild food foraging is increasingly attracting attention as an activity in urban green spaces that encourages urban residents’ interaction with their natural environment. However, little is known about the criteria influencing urban foragers’ selection of foraging locations that could inform urban green space management and planning to encourage urban foraging. To elicit these criteria, we conducted 21 semi-structured expert interviews with urban foraging stakeholders in Vienna, Austria, and analysed the data using qualitative content analysis. The respondents suggested 11 criteria that influence the selection of foraging locations. These are related to spatial factors, management of public urban green spaces and the green space activities of other visitors. However, the respondents reported that urban foragers do not uniformly follow these different criteria, but subjectively assess and apply them depending on the specific locations and the plant materials and mushroom species being targeted. For some foragers, even intensively managed public urban green spaces can offer certain advantages. Thus, urban residents forage in public urban green spaces that have diverse properties and management strategies. We suggest that urban foraging is best supported by biodiversity- and wilderness-friendly green space management that supports access to foraging locations, clear foraging regulations and codes of conduct, and comprehensive information about contamination for urban residents. Implementation of these suggestions would not only benefit urban foraging, but also enhance urban biodiversity and guarantee the multifunctional benefits of public urban green spaces for urban residents and urban nature.     

The effect of spontaneous wild vegetation on landscape preferences in urban green spaces

The use of spontaneous wild vegetation (SWV) in the plans for urban greening in many cities is beginning to be discussed. However, little is known about how it is perceived and valued by citizens. The aim of this study was to determine the effect of SWV on landscape preferences. An online questionnaire was designed and given to a sample of 708 people in Latin America. The results show that they prefer more formal green spaces to those dominated by SWV. Once informed of the benefits that SWV brings to the city, preferences change, with wild vegetation spaces being more appreciated than formal ones. However, this pattern of preferences changes after 30 days. Preferences return to their initial point, with formal green spaces being appreciated again over wild spaces. The analyses show the importance of environmental education in urban greening strategies to communicate clearly, repeatedly and participatively the benefits of using SWV in public green spaces.     

Community perceptions of ecosystem services and disservices linked to urban tree plantings

The planting of trees in streets and parks is critical for urban greening efforts that seek to improve climate-change resilience in cities around the world. Ecosystem services provided by urban trees range from mitigating urban heat island effects to enhancing human well-being and conserving native biodiversity. At the same time, such tree services trade off with disservices that include risk to human safety from falling branches and infrastructure damage from root growth. Here, we performed a survey of residents of a sub-tropical region in eastern Australia to determine community perceptions of the ecosystem services and disservices linked to urban tree plantings. Our aim was to better understand the diverse perceptions of the community, prior to on-the-ground implementation of urban greening, to help guide planting programs in streets and parklands that are vulnerable to UHI effects in the region. We found strong evidence for a high level of public awareness about the beneficial ecosystem services that urban trees can provide. A broad spectrum of beneficial tree services were valued highly by the community in their urban environment including the planting of native trees that can attract and provide food for preferred wildlife; provide shade and reduce heat; allow for a strong connection with nature; have the potential to store carbon to mitigate climate change; provide a level of protection from bushfires; have aesthetically pleasing properties; and produce food for people. At the same time, however, community concerns about tree disservices were concentrated primarily on root damage to infrastructure as well as property damage and injury from falling branches. Our elicitation of community attitudes to tree services and disservices will allow for residents’ most important values and strongest concerns about trees to be explicitly taken into account when establishing a community-inclusive approach to urban tree planting.     

Greening urban road verges highlights diverse views of multiple stakeholders on ecosystem service provision,challenges and preferred form

Globally, there is growing recognition of the potential of road verges to contribute to urban greening and ecosystem service provision, beyond their original functions of utility provision and public access. Numerous, diverse stakeholders are involved in their management, yet their shared and diverging perspectives on verge greening are poorly understood. This research examined the perspectives on road verge greening by 30 respondents from eight stakeholder groups from the Perth Metropolitan Area, Australia. Stakeholders spanned local and state governments, developers, peak bodies, utility providers, environmental consultants, verge treatment providers and urban greening advocates. Semi-directed interviews and Likert scales were used to assess respondents' perspectives and perceived importance of urban verge functions and ecosystem services, risks and challenges associated with verge greening, and preferred verge vegetation composition. The most important ecosystem services for all stakeholders were temperature regulation (through the provision of street trees), those associated with water management and aesthetically interesting streetscapes. Perceived challenges included limited knowledge for the management of native species verges and streetscapes, organisational costs for verge managers and utility providers, and the need to engage with multiple local government authorities with widely varying management and financial valuation of verge vegetation. Stakeholders’ preferred verge reflected diverse uses, local characteristics, and was climate and water resilient (particularly ‘waterwise’). A majority of stakeholder groups felt greater attention to the ‘understorey’ of the ‘urban forest’ was warranted. An emerging perspective across four stakeholder groups identified the potential for verges to grow a local ‘sense of place’, through plantings emphasising local native species and highlighting local Whadjuk Noongar seasons. These findings support policies and programmes associated with urban greening, and assist in navigating the contestation often associated with new or transformative uses of land at the public-private interface.     

Human and biophysical legacies shape contemporary urban forests: A literature synthesis

Understanding how urban forests developed their current patterns of tree canopy cover, species composition, and diversity requires an appreciation of historical legacy effects. However, analyses of current urban forest characteristics are often limited to contemporary socioeconomic factors, overlooking the role of history. The institutions, human communities, and biophysical conditions of cities change over time, creating layers of legacies on the landscape, shifting urban forests through complex interactive processes and feedbacks. Urban green spaces and planted trees can persist long after their establishment, meaning that today’s mature canopy reflects conditions and decisions from many years prior. In this synthesis article, we discuss some of the major historical human and biophysical drivers and associated legacy effects expressed in present urban forest patterns, highlighting examples in the United States and Canada. The bioregional context – native biome, climate, topography, initial vegetation, and pre-urbanization land use – represents the initial conditions in which a city established and grew, and this context influences how legacy effects unfold. Human drivers of legacy effects can reflect specific historical periods: colonial histories related to the symbolism of certain species, and the urban parks and civic beautification movements. Other human drivers include phenomena that cut across time periods such as neighborhood urban form and socioeconomic change. Biophysical legacy effects include the consequences of past disturbances such as extreme weather events and pest and disease outbreaks. Urban tree professionals play a major role in many legacy effects by mediating the interactions and feedbacks between biophysical and human drivers. We emphasize the importance of historical perspectives to understand past drivers that have produced current urban forest patterns, and call for interdisciplinary and mixed methods research to unpack the mechanisms of long-term urban forest change at intra- and inter-city scales.     

Visitors’ heterogeneous preferences for urban park management: The case of a city park in Oulu,Finland

Utilizing survey data collected using a combined travel cost – conditional behavior method, the aim of this study was to analyze the heterogeneity of preferences among the residents of a city in Finland for the services of an urban park and its stream network. More specifically, by analyzing different behavioral responses to potential changes in ecological, cultural, and commercial services, we identified different groups of visitors to the park with a latent class model. A notable result regarding the demand for services in different classes was that low-income people valued the park more than high-income respondents, making improvements in the park’s recreational potential a successful social project. We found two latent classes, the main distinguishing factor of which was the preferences associated with increasing the number of events in the park. Adding events did not increase the benefits for the first class, but for the second class it did. In relation to class membership, if visitors usually visited the park alone or if they walked or cycled to the park, this increased the likelihood of belonging to a particular visitor group. In addition, we assessed how a possible increase in services affected the recreational value of the urban park for the city’s residents. We found that both the total and net value for different urban groups depended on three factors, i.e., the number of visits, the recreational value of a visit, and the proportion of people in each visitor group. We also used the results of the study to assess the profitability of a construction and management project in the park and found that the project was socially very profitable. Although our study examined a specific park in Finland, its results could also potentially be used when planning the management of other urban parks.     

Multiple factors shape the interaction of people with urban greenspace: Sweden as a case study

This study identifies and analyses multiple factors that impact people’s interactions with urban greenspace in Sweden. An unrestricted, self-selected online survey was used to collect the data. The survey questions were related to individual characteristics of respondents, including socio-demographic characteristics, self-reported nature connectedness, and self-reported constraints to greenspace usage; perceived characteristics of urban greenspace, including its availability, quality, and accessibility, and benefits and problems; and preferences of respondents regarding types of urban greenspace and activities. Additionally, several spatially explicit variables were included in the analysis. A total of 2806 respondents from 208 (of 290) municipalities completed the survey. Our findings indicate that greenspace users are highly heterogeneous and utilise diverse green spaces along the urban-peri-urban gradient for various benefits. The statistical analyses identified 61 explanatory variables that affect the frequency of interactions with urban greenspace. In addition, we identify key factors that shape critical differences between frequent and infrequent urban users, such as nature connectedness, perceptions of urban greenspace functions, and their perceived accessibility. Our results highlight the complex challenge facing urban planners and managers of green spaces, who have to consider and integrate a vast array of factors influencing the willingness of increasingly diverse urban populations to interact with greenspace.     

Environmental inequities in terms of different types of urban greenery in Hartford,Connecticut

Urban greenery has long been recognized as an important component of urban ecosystem and provides many benefits to urban residents. However, different types of urban greenery provide different kinds of natural experiences to people. In this study, green metrics calculated based on multisource spatial datasets were used to quantify the spatial distribution of different types of urban greenery in Hartford, Connecticut. Geo-tagged Google Street View images, which capture the profile view of cityscape, were used to quantify street greenery by considering the time information. Land cover map and urban parks map were used to measure residential yard greenery and proximity to urban parks, respectively. We analyzed the associations of the calculated green metrics with socio-economic variables derived from census data. Statistical results show that: (1) people with higher income tend to live in neighborhoods with more street greenery; (2) census block groups with a higher proportion of owner-occupied units tend to have more yard vegetation and yard tree/shrub coverage; (3) Hispanics tend to live in block groups that have less yard vegetation but African Americans mostly live in block groups with more yard greenery; and (4) there are no significant environmental disparities among racial/ethnic groups in terms of proximity to urban parks. In general, this study provides an insight into the environments of urban residents in terms of urban greenery, and a valuable reference data for urban planning.     

The multidimensionality of urban nature: The well-being and integration of immigrants in Finland

Activities in natural environments greatly enhance human well-being and can support the integration of foreigners into a new country. This article explores how residents from different ethnic backgrounds in Turku, Finland appreciated and engaged with urban natural environments and how this engagement benefitted their well-being and, ultimately, their integration. Individuals enjoy activities in nature in particular ways, which may vary according to a person’s physical, social, and psychological characteristics. This is especially true for immigrants who apply traditions from their home countries to the ways in which they interact with their new environment and enjoy activities in nature. Three dimensions of nature experience—social, emotional, and normative—emerged from the research, which, in turn, supported well-being and different types of integration: interactive, identificational, and cognitive. We argue that because these dimensions are an integral part of a person’s identity and cultural background, familiarity with them may prove pivotal to constructing more welcoming and intercultural urban natural environments. Different approaches to engaging with nature should be considered in the design of urban environments and urban nature, as well as in integration programmes, to enhance the well-being and integration of foreign-background populations.     

玉林市城区道路绿化树种调查及配置模式研究

以玉林市城区道路绿化建设的必要性为出发点,以打造玉林市＂城在林中,路在绿中,房在园中,人在景中＂的绿化格局为目标,通过对城区道路绿化树种生活型、主要观赏特性、生长状况、配置方式等方面进行系统调查及筛选,结合玉林的发展规模和道路绿化状况,探索出对玉林市绿化树种选择及配置的合理对策,以期为广西乃至全国的城市道路绿化提供科学依据。     

Economic aspects of urban greenness along a dryland rainfall gradient: A time-series analysis

Studies at the global scale show that urban greenness is not equally distributed across and within cities. Yet, quantification of urban greening trends in drylands is still lacking. We have modeled urban greenness dynamics and its determinants, using Landsat-based time-series analyses of NDVI and census data, of 23 localities along a dryland climatic gradient in southern Israel, between 1997 and 2019. NDVI trends and their associated temporal changes in local average wages, age of locality, and average annual rainfall were analyzed by exploiting a panel structure and model parameters estimation with fixed effects to control for unobserved differences between localities, and to strengthen causal interpretation. Results show positive NDVI trends in all localities—indicating that urban construction increases greenness in drylands. However, the localities varied greatly in the slopes of their respective linear NDVI trends (0.05 <α < 0.161). Specifically, we found that, ceteris paribus, the differences in average wages between localities is the most important factor in explaining spatio-temporal differences between the respective NDVI of localities. Given the well-known high correlation between individuals’ wages and other characteristic such as education and income (all important determinants of the Socio-Economic classification of local authorities), this leads us to conclude that residents’ economic characteristics are an important predictor of the level of greenness. Harlin’s Granger causality test for wages and NDVI panel data indicate that wage is a Granger cause of urban greenness (p < 0.001)—however, greenness was not found to be the driving force of wage.