Evaluation of water quality in an urban park for environmental sensitization: A large scale simulation model

Abstract

Urban parks are important components of the urban environment since they are critical to improving livelihoods and the environment in densely populated cities, offering also shelter to several wildlife species and opportunities for outdoor educational activities. The park of Environmental Information and Sensitization „Antonis Tritsis” is the largest park of the Athens metropolitan area (∼1.15 km2) including an artificial system of six large reservoirs referred as lakes of total surface of approximately 6 hectares (5–6% of its total surface) constituting the largest surface of fresh water within the city structure. The aforementioned system is a „controlled” one since it is fed by two distinctly different, monitored water sources, namely the pumped local water and the occasional runoff from rains. The bottom of the „lakes” is covered by geomembrane allowing the system to be considered as a very large scale simulation experiment. The results obtained provide insight into the biochemical functioning of the ...