Abstract
As public service facilities, urban parks offer many benefits for daily life and social activities for residents. However, the accessibility of public parks to urban residents is often unevenly distributed in spaces that cannot be utilized fully. Here, we used the urban parks in Beijing, China as a case study and examined the relationship between urban park accessibility and population distribution at different administrative levels. Gini coefficient and Lorenz curve were used to evaluate the social equity of urban park accessibility, and the location quotient was used to identify the spatial difference between urban parks and resident population. The results of our study show that the urban park accessibility varies at district and subdistrict levels and that places with more urban parks usually have higher accessibility. Very importantly, the spatial equity is different from the social equity, a mismatch exists between the spatial distribution of urban parks and population, particularly for the elderly residents. These results generate valuable insights, as, in China and many developing countries, current urban public green space planning only uses the ratio of public green space to urban construction land and the per capita public green area.
Highlights
Green landscapes in metropolitan areas, such as urban parks, provide the city with various ecological, economic and social benefits, and are widely recognized as a critical component to the life quality of urban inhabitants [1,2]
The results of our study show that indicators currently used in urban public green space planning, that is, the ratio of public green space to urban construction land and the per capita public green area, are not able to reflect the social equity of the urban park resources, that is, the accessibility of the urban parks to different aging groups
Our results further confirmed that spatial equity was significantly different from social equity, and a spatial mismatch still exists between the distribution of urban parks and population, for the elderly residents. These findings suggest that the pattern of place–based equity is different from population–based social equity, and the high urban park accessibility does not equate to high social equity
Summary
Green landscapes in metropolitan areas, such as urban parks, provide the city with various ecological, economic and social benefits, and are widely recognized as a critical component to the life quality of urban inhabitants [1,2]. Many studies have investigated the landscape patterns [3,4], ecological effects [5,6,7,8], health benefits [9,10], and accessibility [11,12,13] of urban parks. There is evidence that access to nearby parks and open spaces is associated with physical and psychological health, such as mood change, reduced anxiety, and childhood obesity [18]. These benefits may be important for people with reduced mobility and cognitive function [19]. Maas et al (2009) [20] argued that the elderly (aged 65 +) may feel more social support and less lonely when living close to green spaces, and other studies showed that access to parks may increase their longevity [21,22]
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