scholarly journals Informal urban green space: Residents’ perception, use, and management preferences across four major Japanese shrinking cities

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christoph Rupprecht

Urban residents’ health depends on green infrastructure to cope with climate change. Shrinking cities could utilize vacant land to provide more green space, but declining tax revenues preclude new park development – a situation pronounced in Japan, where some cities are projected to shrink by over ten percent, but lack green space. Could informal urban green spaces (IGS; vacant lots, street verges, brownfields etc.) supplement parks in shrinking cities? This study analyzes residents’ perception, use, and management preferences (management goals, approaches to participatory management, willingness to participate) for IGS using a large, representative online survey (n=1,000) across four major shrinking Japanese cities: Sapporo, Nagano, Kyoto and Kitakyushu. Results show that residents saw IGS as a common element of the urban landscape and their daily lives, but their evaluation was mixed. Recreation and urban agriculture were preferred to redevelopment and non-management. For participative management, residents saw a need for the city administration to mediate usage and liability, and expected an improved appearance, but emphasized the need for financial and non-financial support. A small but significant minority (~10%) were willing to participate in management activities. On this basis, eight principles for participatory informal green space planning are proposed.

2012 ◽  
Vol 518-523 ◽  
pp. 5972-5979
Author(s):  
Qing Chang ◽  
Yao Qiu ◽  
Xue Li ◽  
Jian Sheng Wu

Urban green spaces are considered as the life support system in a city, if systematically planned, developed, and maintained, they may provide various ecosystem services in a sustainable way. By integrating the morphological spatial pattern analysis (MSPA) and the green infrastructure (GI) network based on GIS, this study provided an urban green space planning method to guide urban sustainable spatial development and land use decisions in the Longgang District of Shenzhen in China. The approach has a robust performance in identifying the vital hubs and linkages in the urban green space system. It is hoped that this plan model based on MSPA, the function connectivity of urban green spaces could be farther strengthened so that some key zones in landscape pattern could be protected in the future development.


Author(s):  
Sara Barron ◽  
Sophie Nitoslawski ◽  
Kathleen L. Wolf ◽  
Angie Woo ◽  
Erin Desautels ◽  
...  

It is increasingly evident that exposure to green landscape elements benefits human health. Urban green space in cities is also recognized as a crucial adaptation response to changes in climate and its subsequent effects. The exploration of conceptual and practical intersections between human health, green spaces, and climate action is needed. Evidence-based guidance is needed for stakeholders, practitioners, designers, and citizens in order to assess and manage urban green spaces that maximize co-benefits for both human health and climate resilience. This paper proposes interventions that provide strategic green space enhancement at the neighborhood and block scale. We propose eight tangible green space interventions and associated metrics to integrate climate resilience and population health co-benefits into urban green space design and planning: View from within, Plant entrances, Bring nature nearby, Retain the mature, Generate diversity, Create refuge, Connect experiences, and Optimize green infrastructure. These interventions represent a hierarchy of functional design concepts that respond to experiential qualities and physical/psychological dimensions of health, and which enhance resilience at a range of social scales from the individual to the neighborhood. The interventions also reveal additional research needs in green space design, particularly in neighborhood-level contexts.


Author(s):  
Anna E de Jager ◽  
Melanie D Nicolau

In this paper, the Tourist Area Life Cycle (TALC) model was adapted for application to an urban green space that is not necessarily a tourist destination. Important components of the TALC model, such as carrying capacity, critical life cycle points and a variety of scenarios relevant to urban green spaces that do not primarily have a tourism focus were considered in the development of an adapted model that could be of value in the management of a variety of functions in such spaces. A case study approach was followed, in which the model was applied to the Rietvlei Nature Reserve in Tshwane (South Africa). The functions and benefits of the Rietvlei Nature Reserve include the protection of a portion of the Highland grassland biome with the associated biodiversity, recreation, opportunities for environmental education research, and water provisioning to the City of Tshwane. Qualitative and quantitative data were collected through observation, individual interviews, focus groups and questionnaires, with a total of 558 respondents. The data included primary and secondary sources, and the researchers’ own observations. The management of a variety of ecosystem services provided by the conservation area and surrounding urban landscape plays an important role in the life cycle of this urban green space. The value of this study lies in demonstrating that an adaptation of the TALC model can be of value in the sustainable management of the ecological services that urban green spaces provide to urban dwellers.


2019 ◽  
Vol 266 ◽  
pp. 06006
Author(s):  
Faiza Darkhani ◽  
Osman Mohd Tahir ◽  
Roziya Ibrahi

In order to achieve high-quality urban landscape management, it is important to have a proper management system. Some developing countries are facing a decline of green spaces due to lack of proper management. This paper aims to identify best management practices and provide a comparison regarding the governance of urban landscape management in the context of three countries: England, Malaysia and Singapore. It also highlights the importance of establishing more appropriate programs in order to achieve the goal of sustainability. The findings show that good and proper planning as well as programs and activities in the local government system can enhance and increase urban green space in a landscape. The contribution of this paper is to increase the local authority’s knowledge of managing the landscape and decreasing the deterioration and decline of urban green spaces in a landscape.


2019 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
Faiza Darkhani ◽  
Osman Mohd Tahir ◽  
Roziya Ibrahim

Abstract To achieve high-quality urban landscape management, it is important to have a proper management system. Some developing countries like Afghanistan are facing a decline of green spaces due to lack of proper management. This is a qualitative study with content analysis which provides a brief review of the management system in three selected countries, namely England, Malaysia and Singapore, by examining their urban landscape management systems. It also highlights the importance of establishing more appropriate programs to achieve the goal of sustainability. The findings show that good and proper planning, as well as programs and activities in the local government system, can enhance and increase urban green space in urban landscape. The contribution of this paper is to increase the local authority’s knowledge of managing the urban landscape and decreasing the deterioration and decline of urban green spaces in urban landscape.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 4699
Author(s):  
Kinga Szilágyi ◽  
Chaima Lahmar ◽  
Camila Andressa Pereira Rosa ◽  
Krisztina Szabó

Historic allées and urban avenues reflect a far-sighted and forward-thinking design attitude. These compositions are the living witnesses of olden times, suggesting permanence. However, the 20th century’s urban development severely damaged the environment, therefore hundred-year-old mature trees are relatively rare among city avenues’ stands. Due to the deteriorated habitat conditions, replantation may be necessary from time to time. However, there are a large number of replanted allées and urban avenues considered historical monuments, according to the relevant international literature in urban and living heritage’s preservation. The renewal often results in planting a different, urban tolerant taxon, as seen in several examples reviewed. Nevertheless, the allée remains an essential urban structural element, though often with a changed character. The Budapest Andrássy Avenue, a city and nature connection defined in the late 19th century’s urban landscape planning, aimed to offer a splendid link between city core and nature in Városliget Public Park. The 19–20th century’s history and urban development are well documented in Hungarian and several English publications, though current tree stock stand and linear urban green infrastructure as part of the urban landscape need a detailed survey. The site analyses ran in 2020–early 2021 created a basis for assessing the allées and the whole avenue as an urban ecosystem and a valuable case study of contemporary heritage protection problems. Andrassy Avenue, the unique urban fabric, architecture, and promenades have been a world heritage monument of cultural value since 2002. The allées became endangered despite reconstruction type maintenance efforts. The presented survey analyses the living heritage’s former renewal programs and underlines the necessity of new reconstruction concepts in urban heritage protection. We hypothesize that urban green infrastructure development, the main issue in the 21st century to improve the urban ecological system and human liveability, may support heritage protection. The Budapest World Heritage Site is worthwhile for a complex renewal where the urban green ecosystem supply and liveable, pedestrian-friendly urban open space system are at the forefront to recall the once glorious, socially and aesthetically attractive avenue.


2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (12) ◽  
pp. 6930
Author(s):  
Shinsuke Kyoi

This study evaluates people’s preferences regarding the proximity of their residence to agricultural urban green infrastructure (UGI), such as agricultural land and satoyama, and discusses the availability of these types of land as UGI. UGI is vital for reducing the negative environmental impacts of urban areas, as these impacts are too large to ignore. In this study, we conducted an online survey and a choice experiment to investigate people’s perceptions regarding the proximity of their residence to agricultural UGI (AUGI). The respondents of the choice experiment were 802 inhabitants of Ishikawa Prefecture, Japan, which has rich agricultural resources. To examine explicitly the spatial autocorrelation of people’s preferences, in this study, we used the spatial econometrics method. The main empirical findings are that people prefer agricultural land far away from their residence—more than 1000 m, not within 1000 m—which reflects the not-in-my-backyard phenomenon. Meanwhile, people’s preferences regarding proximity to satoyama are complicated and their preferences are positively spatially autocorrelated. The results indicate that policymakers and urban planners should manage and provide AUGI far away from residential areas; otherwise, they must address people’s avoidance of neighboring AUGI.


2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (11) ◽  
pp. 3917 ◽  
Author(s):  
K Rahman ◽  
Dunfu Zhang

This study estimates the factors affecting socially vulnerable groups’ demand for and accessibility levels to green public spaces in Dhaka City, Bangladesh. Dhaka is a high-density city with one of the lowest levels of green space per capita in the world. Dhaka has just 8.5% of tree-covered lands, while an ideal city requires at least 20% of green space. Urban public green space provides a healthy environment to city dwellers as well as ecological soundness. This study aims to examine the effects of population density and size of a community area (Thana) on the social demand for and accessibility to green parks. To determine the socially vulnerable group demand index, this study used demographic data from the National Population and Housing Census 2011 conducted by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics. This study used geographical data extracted from Google Earth Pro to measure accessibility levels, and additionally analyzed geographical data with ArcGIS 10.0 and Google Earth Pro. We drew radius circles using Free Map Tools to measure time-distance weighted scores from community areas to urban green spaces. The results show that the large population size of socially vulnerable groups creates very high demand at the score of 0.61 for urban green public parks and small-sized, high-density community areas generate very good accessibility at 2.01% to green public spaces. These findings are highly useful to policymakers, urban planners, landscape engineers, and city governments to make a compact city sustainable, inclusive, and resilient. Moreover, the notion of a “smart city” might be a smart solution in order to manage Dhaka Megacity sustainably in this modern technological age.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (212) ◽  
pp. 68-72
Author(s):  
Mikhail Motyl ◽  
◽  
Alexander Romanyuk ◽  
Vladimir Titok

The features of the conjugated structure of plants of the lawn-grass cover of the city of Minsk as an unique object of a natural-anthropogenic landscape and a phyto-indicator of the current state of urban green spaces of Belarus are established. The basic composition of 35 species of native flora, which form 10 conjugated groups and reflect diversity of ecological niches, is determined. Their composition and the nature of the bonds indicate a tendency toward xerophytization of the soil cover. The data obtained reflect the initial stage of its transformation and can serve as a starting point for monitoring climate and anthropogenic changes in the structure of urban green spaces.


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