Green infrastructure as understood by stakeholders in small and medium-sized towns in Poland

Abstract

Motives: In urban governance processes involving local communities, green infrastructure (GI) is an important proxy for the local quality of life. In this paper, the authors focus on GI in small and medium-sized Polish towns, which attracts much less research interest than that in large cities. The study covered 97 towns, and it included desk research and a questionnaire survey of local authorities and NGOs.Aim: The aim of the study was to determine whether residents are involved in the management of urban GI, whether local authorities and communities have identified the need to develop new GI, and whether they are taking appropriate measures to maintain and preserve the existing GI resources. Another objective was to examine the priority of existing GI resources in governance policies.Results: The levels of citizen participation and GI management in small and medium-sized towns were ranked. The general observation is that green spaces are not an effective participation tool in small towns. The situation has gradually improved in medium-sized cities and towns within metropolitan regions, but this does not seem to be a determining factor.