scholarly journals What Characteristics of Urban Green Spaces and Recreational Activities Do Self-Reported Stressed Individuals Like? A Case Study of Baoji, China

Author(s):  
Tian Gao ◽  
Rui Song ◽  
Ling Zhu ◽  
Ling Qiu

Several studies have revealed the positive effects of green space and certain activities on counteracting the physical and mental pressure felt by human beings. However, how self-reported stressed people perceive restorative green spaces, their preferences for specific characteristics and activities, and what characteristics of urban green space can induce various types of activities for stress recovery has not been fully examined in the high-density cities of China. Using an on-site questionnaire survey conducted in the People’s Park (PP) in Baoji, China, this study is the first to consider the relationship among eight sensory dimensions, activity types and stress recovery in Chinese green space. Results showed that the highest-stressed respondents were more likely to spend their time in multi-layered woodlands adjacent to water, with more experiences of serene but less about prospect. They preferred serene dimension more, while the culture and social dimensions were least preferred. Sports and leisure activities and quiet activities were the most popular among highest-stressed respondents, which were positively related to the serene and nature dimensions, respectively. Results suggested that the most restorative environment for stress recovery can be regarded as multi-layered woodlands adjacent to water with more serene and nature, less prospect and few or no culture and social dimensions.

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
Author(s):  
Petra Viebrantz ◽  
Maria Fernandes-Jesus

Urban Green Spaces (UGSs) play a key role in people's well-being, particularly in highly urbanized contexts and possess several elements that may be attractive to visitors. This study focuses on the views and perceptions of visitors of two UGSs located in Lisbon and aimed to determine how they evaluated two different green spaces (Estrela Park and Alameda Park) in terms of physical/natural characteristics, structures, accessibility, surrounding areas, motives for use and importance. Secondly, it sought to explore how people evaluate UGSs in Lisbon in terms of quality and quantity. A total of 188 people responded to a questionnaire composed of close-and open-ended questions. The study revealed that Estrela Park was more valued for its green space characteristics and conservation aspects than accessibility and sports adaptability. Participants visited Estrela Park for its landscape and restful environment and considered the park important to their lives. Although they visited Estrela Park less often, they stayed longer compared to those who visited Alameda Park. Furthermore, regarding the participants' overall perceptions of the UGSs in Lisbon, many participants mentioned the need for more parks and wanted better preservation and distribution around the city. Most importantly, they valued these spaces and believed that UGS helped them to feel more relaxed and balanced, facilitating socialization, recreation and physical activities. In conclusion, this study suggests that green and quiet urban parks in Lisbon are valued by the city's population but they would like to see regular maintenance/cleaning as well as the provision of leisure activities.


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.


2021 ◽  
Vol 263 (1) ◽  
pp. 5780-5791
Author(s):  
Omid Samani ◽  
Verena Zapf ◽  
M. Ercan Altinsoy

Urban green spaces are intended to provide citizens with calm environments free of annoying city noises. This requires a thorough understanding of noise emission and related exposure to sounds in green spaces. This research investigates noise perception in various spots in an urban green space. For this purpose, the study has been conducted in the grand garden of the city of Dresden. The garden covers 1.8 square kilometers of various landscapes, including water streams, park railways, fountains, bridges, roads for bicycles and pedestrians etc. Noise perception was investigated at eleven spots with emphasis on four noise types: nature noise, human noise, traffic noise, and technical noise. In parallel, audio-visual recordings were conducted for each spot to identify the connection between the perceptual measures and the psychoacoustic parameters. These spots are categorized based on the resulting perception and psychoacoustic parameters. In addition, the visual effect of each spot on final perception is investigated. Eventually, annoyance for each spot is identified based on the corresponding participants' perception and is associated with the relevant psychoacoustic parameters.


2018 ◽  
Vol 15 ◽  
pp. 77-86
Author(s):  
Mahendra Singh Thapa ◽  
Gokul Poudel

Urban green spaces are integral part of urban infrastructure. Green spaces can offer a number of benefits ranging from inner spiritual to outer materialistic values. Available green spaces in particular area especially in urban places need to be identified and located properly with scientific way and means so that we can use those places in emergency caused by natural or human induced hazards. This study has tried to measure the green space available for people dwelling in Butwal Sub-Metropolitan City of Nepal. An attempt was made to quantify green spaces in urban environments from Landsat 8 OLI imageries using object-oriented approach and field verification. The study concluded that the total green space available in Butwal Sub-Metropolitan City is 86.37 km2 i.e., around 86% of total municipal area and per capita green space is around 623 m2.


Challenges ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 36
Author(s):  
Jennings

Urban green spaces can facilitate positive social interactions in numerous ways. These interactions may lead to the development of social cohesion among city dwellers. This article provides a viewpoint on the potential role that the presence of green space and volunteering can play in the construct of social cohesion. Specifically, the article focuses on one aspect of social cohesion, volunteerism, as a way to illustrate the immense potential of social cohesion to link health with place and the planet.


2016 ◽  
Vol 26 (8) ◽  
pp. 1091-1101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abdullah Akpinar ◽  
Murat Cankurt

This study investigates the associations between characteristics of urban green spaces and frequency and duration of self-reported physical activity in the city of Aydın, Turkey. Data were collected through a survey with 420 participants. We analysed the associations between characteristics of urban green spaces and frequency and duration of general population’ physical activity and physical activity of physically active people with multivariate linear regression while controlling for sex, age, marital status, education level, occupation and household income level. Results showed that for the general population, short distance to urban green spaces, many trees, exercise equipment and picnic areas were positively associated with frequency of physical activity, while barbecue and fire places negatively associated with duration of physical activity. For physically active people, many trees, soccer and basketball fields were positively associated with their frequency of physical activity, but water features were negatively correlated with frequency of physical activity. In regard to duration of physical activity for physically active people, findings showed lawn and exercise equipment were positively correlated with duration of physical activity, while water features, barbecue and fire places were negatively correlated with duration of physical activity. The findings indicate that levels of physical activity in urban green spaces could be promoted with many trees, exercise equipment, picnic areas and lawn. However, causal relationship needs to be conducted with intervention or longitudinal studies.


Author(s):  
Yashaswini S* ◽  
Shankar B

Improving the Accessibility of Urban Green Space (UGS) is an integral part of city planning system. People with better access to green space enjoy a wide range of health benefits. Therefore, it is a crucial element to be taken care and nourished in a land use framework. Mysore City is one of the planned large cities in India. The City had a population of about 0.9 million in 2011 and it is estimated to cross the million mark by 2021. There is a growing consciousness on health and wellbeing among the people resulting an increasing demand for urban green spaces both at neighbourhood and city levels. The accessibility helps in promoting usage of UGS and maintaining the balance in environment within the city areas. The main aim of this paper is to study the existing scenario of the UGS within the planning district-12 and to analyse the green space accessibility. The land use of Mysuru city is analysed to understand the city and the micro level land use analysis of Planning district-12 is made. The existing scenario of the UGS within the study area and its accessibility is analysed using different accessibility indicators. Considering the key findings, issues and challenges are identified. Later the suggestions and recommendations for the identified issues is proposed to enhance the green spaces quality and accessibility at neighbourhood levels. The Accessible Natural Green space Standard (ANGst) type of accessibility analysis has been carried to know UGS functionality. Henceforth urban green space network at Planning District levels (local levels) in the City of Mysuru is prepared as a model which can be implemented to the city as whole at the later stages


Forests ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (12) ◽  
pp. 1614
Author(s):  
Yilei Hou ◽  
Yibing Qu ◽  
Zheng Zhao ◽  
Jinyu Shen ◽  
Yali Wen

The fundamental purpose of future urban development is to meet residents’ yearning for a better city life with the rapid development of urbanization. This study uses a multinomial logit model and cognitive map to evaluate residents’ spatial image perception of urban green space. A field study and data collection were conducted from July to August 2019, using the typical urban green space area in Beijing as the research object. Based on 375 valid questionnaires and 139 cognitive maps, the study analyzed and evaluated the image characteristics and differences of residents to the urban green space under different conditions. The results show the following. First, there is a close relationship between residents’ preference and the characteristics of urban green spaces, especially the working and living environment and characteristics will have a great influence on it. Second, the cognitive map drawn by Beijing residents can be divided into sequential and spatial cognitive maps, and the image perception shows diversified characteristics. However, the perception is relatively superficial overall, and most are simple line maps. Besides, according to the analysis of the elements of the cognitive map, the advantages and disadvantages of each type of urban green space are closely related to their geographical location and internal structure. This study has two key findings. First, the construction of urban green spaces in various cities should be carried out according to local conditions, considering the scientific basis and reasonableness of urban green space in terms of structural setting. Second, the multinomial logit model and cognitive map can effectively quantify the subjective evaluation of respondents’ spatial perceptions in a relatively simple manner, which can be further expanded in the application system design of the method.


2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (15) ◽  
pp. 4189 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sung-Kwon Hong ◽  
Sang-Woo Lee ◽  
Hyun-Kil Jo ◽  
Miyeon Yoo

Exposure to green spaces can reduce the negative effects of stress. This study examines how frequency of visits and time spent in urban green spaces (UGS) affect urban dwellers’ subjective well-being. We also investigated the numbers of respondents visiting UGS, their primary motivation, and constraints on their ability to visit. Using quota sampling, an online survey was conducted of 400 residents of Daejeon City, South Korea. ANOVA results indicated no significant interactions between visit frequency and time spent in UGS. Respondents who had visited UGS within the past two weeks expressed higher positive and lower negative emotions than did non-visitors, regardless of visit frequency, and regular visitors showed higher general life satisfaction levels. These positive effects were confirmed by estimated structural equation models. However, the time spent in UGS did not affect emotions or life satisfaction in general. Heavy users mostly visited UGS to walk, and light/non-users cited the lack of urban green spaces near their home as the major constraint on visiting UGS. The estimated structural equation models clearly show positive effects from motivation and negative effects of constraints and access time to UGS on visit frequency. To improve urban dwellers’ subjective well-being, UGS should prioritize good walking environments and accessibility.


Land ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (11) ◽  
pp. 453
Author(s):  
Marcin Feltynowski ◽  
Jakub Kronenberg

Urban green spaces are frequently presented as being important for urban quality of life and urban development in general, but more detailed interpretations and discussions are typically confined to large urban centers, the so-called first- and second-tier cities. Not enough attention has been paid to smaller urban units, the third-tier towns. The main goal of this article is to investigate the share and types of urban green spaces in five selected towns in Poland. We compare different sources of data based on satellite imagery and land-use maps with those used in public statistics, to check whether town authorities are managing all potential green spaces or only a selected part of them. We find that the predominantly used data, based on what is classified as “urban green space” for the purposes of public statistics, obscure the complexity of urban green spaces and focus on the narrowly understood formally managed public green spaces (which occupy 3.5–5.7% of town areas). Meanwhile, based on other sources, such as the national land-use map (BDOT10k), Urban Atlas, and satellite imagery (Landsat 8), what is considered to be green space turns out to cover 50–80% of the town area. The latter large numbers are associated with the predominance of arable land, grasslands, and forests, overlooked in any green space management practices based on data and definitions adopted for the purposes of public statistics. The situation found in our five case study towns resembles that identified in larger cities in Poland, and it exhibits the inadequacy of public statistics definitions and the related management practices, hindering the management of urban green spaces as an interconnected system of urban green infrastructures.


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