Green Space Network Research Articles

Survey of urban greenway satisfaction based on a fuzzy comprehensive evaluation

Greenways are an important component of the ecological network of urban green spaces and contribute to ensuring a complete and continuous ecosystem. Once a city’s greenways have been built, their future success relies heavily on visitors’ intuitive feelings and satisfaction. Therefore, it is necessary to evaluate visitor satisfaction with greenways. Using Greenway No. 1 in Shanghai’s Minhang District as an example, we in this article constructed an index system to evaluate visitor satisfaction with the greenway based on a fuzzy comprehensive evaluation method. The visitors’ demographic and behavioral characteristics and their comprehensive reviews of Greenway No. 1 were analyzed. The results showed that the gender ratio among visitors to Greenway No. 1 was relatively balanced. Most visitors were retired and elderly, and most were from nearby areas. The visitors used the greenway frequently, and the travel time for most was less than ten minutes. The overall visitor satisfaction with the greenway reached the “satisfied” level, and most indices reached the basic level of satisfaction. However, certain basic service facilities were found to be inadequate. The results provide suggestions and references for the construction of greenways in Shanghai and surrounding provinces and cities.

Older Adults' Outdoor Walking and Inequalities in Neighbourhood Green Spaces Characteristics.

Outdoor walking has considerable benefits for healthy ageing and older adults are recommended to walk regularly. However, older adults living in high-deprivation areas walk less than those living in low-deprivation areas. Previous research has shown that the characteristics of neighbourhood green spaces (i.e., proximity, attractiveness, size, and number) may influence outdoor walking. This study examines spatial inequalities in the characteristics of neighbourhood green spaces in high- versus low-deprivation areas and their possible influences on disparities in older adults’ outdoor walking levels. For this purpose, it included a sample of 173 participants (≥65 years) and used secondary data and a geographic information system (GIS) to objectively measure neighbourhood green spaces characteristics. Geographic positioning system (GPS) technology was used to objectively measure outdoor walking levels. Data on participants’ personal characteristics were collected by questionnaire. The results indicate that one characteristic of neighbourhood green spaces (i.e., size) is positively related to outdoor walking levels. They show that inequalities in neighbourhood green spaces’ size in high- versus low-deprivation areas may influence disparities in older adults’ outdoor walking levels. Despite inequalities in other neighbourhood green space characteristics (e.g., proximity, attractiveness, and number) in high- versus low-deprivation areas, no relationship was found between these neighbourhood green space characteristics and participants’ outdoor walking levels. Enhancing the distribution or creation of large neighbourhood green spaces (e.g., through creating green space networks) may enhance outdoor walking among older residents, especially in high-deprivation areas.

A study on multi-scale plans for the park and green space network development in Oslo

A study on multi-scale plans for the park and green space network development in Oslo

Heuristic decision tree model for ecological urban green space network construction

Heuristic decision tree model for ecological urban green space network construction

Home Range of a Large Forest Eagle in a Suburban Landscape: Crowned Eagles (Stephanoaetus coronatus) in the Durban Metropolitan Open Space System, South Africa

Apex predators are sensitive to human disturbance and persecution, often becoming the first losses in a declining urban wildlife community. A population of Crowned Eagles (Stephanoaetus coronatus) within eThekwini municipality, KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, persists in a green space network called the Durban Metropolitan Open Space System (DMOSS). We used GPS–UHF telemetry to investigate the home range and habitat use of five breeding adult Crowned Eagles for 1 yr. We documented a mean annual home range for four birds of 13 km2 (Minimum Convex Polygon [MCP] 100%), or 6.3 km2 (Kernel Density Estimator [KDE], bandwith HLSCV 95%), equating to small home ranges for this large eagle, compared with other large eagles. Habitat use within home ranges and correlation with DMOSS area underscored the importance of retaining forest patches in the urban mosaic landscape to encourage the persistence of this large raptor. Our study highlighted the importance of planning green space in future city expansion and land development. The spatial and habitat associations of Crowned Eagles may be used to inform urban planners who wish to support biodiverse communities that include apex predators in an urban landscape.

Effects of Spatial Pattern of Forest Vegetation on Urban Cooling in a Compact Megacity

Urban forests can be an effective contributor to mitigate the urban heat island (UHI) effect. Understanding the factors that influence the cooling intensity of forest vegetation is essential for creating a more effective urban greenspace network to better counteract the urban warming. The aim of this study was to quantify the effects of spatial patterns of forest vegetation on urban cooling, in the Shanghai metropolitan area of China, using correlation analyses and regression models. Cooling intensity values were calculated based on the land surface temperature (LST) derived from remote sensing imagery and spatial patterns of forest vegetation were quantified by eight landscape metrics, using standard and moving-window approaches. The results suggested that 90 m × 90 m was the optimal spatial scale for studying the cooling effect of forest vegetation in Shanghai’s urban area. It also indicated that woodland performed better than grassland in urban cooling and the size, shape, and spatial distribution of woodland patches had significant impacts on the urban thermal environment. Specifically, the increase of size and the degree of compactness of the patch shape can effectively reduce the LST within the woodland. Areas with a higher percentage of vegetation coverage experienced a greater cooling effect. Moreover, when given a fixed amount of vegetation covers, aggregated distribution provided a stronger cooling effect than fragmented distribution and increasing overall shape complexity of woodlands can enhance the cooling effect on surrounding urban areas. This study provides insights for urban planners and landscape designers to create forest adaptive planning strategies to effectively alleviate the UHI effect.

The socio-ecological practice of building blue-green infrastructure in high-density cities: what does the ABC Waters Program in Singapore tell us?

Blue-green infrastructure (BGI) is the network of green spaces that provides multiple water-related ecosystem services. This article explores the Active, Beautiful, Clean (ABC) Waters Program as a socio-ecological practice that builds BGI for the high-density city-state of Singapore. Launched in 2006, the ABC Waters Program aims to simultaneously improve the recreational value, physical appearance, and water quality of all waters in Singapore through 2030. Driven by the quest for water security and the pursuit of a higher quality of life, the program involves sustainable stormwater management and waterway enhancement to enrich the functions of the existing aquatic and terrestrial green spaces. The ABC Waters Program provides valuable lessons for other high-density cities to overcome land scarcity as a constraint on BGI. With a shortage of green spaces, high-density cities should strive to optimize the existing green spaces in the provision of ecosystem services and to leverage cultural ecosystem services to engage citizens and gain public support. The case study on the ABC Waters Program also reveals a research gap in the socio-ecological practice research on BGI planning and design. The fundamental question of what qualifies as BGI has yet to be answered, and it is rarely discussed to what degree urban waterways can be considered BGI.

Analysis of fragmented green spaces in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Issues concerning urban resilience have now become a great challenge to the world as a result of rapid urbanisation. Malaysia is ranked among East Asia's most urbanised countries and its urban population has continued to increase rapidly from 27 % in 1970 to 74 % in 2014. To cope with the issue of sustainability, urban planning has emerged at creating and managing network of green spaces. The establishment of green corridor has accelerated as a response to global concern about issues regarding the fragmentation, climate changes and loss of landscape connectivity resulted from the urbanisation. To ensure that network of green spaces can be established, the fragmented of green spaces must be first identified and located. An analysis of fragmented green spaces has been conducted by using Object Oriented procedure to the high-resolution satellite image of SPOT-6 dated June 2016. Results showed that big and small fragmented green spaces existed with the total area of 84 km 2 out of 243 km 2 total areas of Kuala Lumpur. The highest total area of green spaces was recorded to be in the Damansara Penchala zone which is 26 km 2 and the lowest record is in the Kuala Lumpur City Center area which is only 5 km 2 in area. It was concluded that urban green spaces are more fragmented where there are more built-up areas. In this paper, city center has the least ratio of area of green to the urban area compared to the other five zones because the green space in the area was smaller and fragmented.

Bangkok’s Green Infrastructure

Infrastructure is the basic foundation of all civilized urban settlements around the world, reflected in each city’s lifestyle and quality of life. Infrastructure is organized around utilities and facilities that connect every part of the city together. Typical infrastructure includes roads, water supply, sewers, power, telecommunications, etc. A city’s urban infrastructure system is much more complex in terms of the many levels of developments underneath the ground, on the ground, and up in the air to facilitate transportation and communication. Multi-functional areas serve people’s needs at the same time. Green infrastructure is an interconnected green space network that is planned and managed for its natural resource values and is related to urban ecology. Bangkok has green infrastructure that we need to protect in the long term. With the growth of a fast expanding city like Bangkok, we seem to have forgotten our cultural and historic way of living in a city once well-known as the “Venice of the East”. Nowadays, our canals have been replaced by roads and boats have been replaced by cars. The city has been developing so fast, without any planning on the use of green infrastructure. Bangkok’s green infrastructure could be an integrated network of green spaces for our sustainable future.

FUNCTIONAL CONNECTIVITY ANALYSES AND CONSTRUCTION STRATEGIES OF THE STRUCTURE OF GREEN SPACE NETWORK IN HAIDIAN DISTRICT OF BEIJING

Urban green space structure and pattern have been one of the highlights in Landscape Architecture studies, accompanying with urgent demands of promoting ecological spatial structures in urban construction. Focusing on functional connectivity and construction strategies of the structure of green space network in Haidian District of Beijing, this research builds resistance surface and identifies linkages through habitat quality evaluation of the InVEST Model and the simulation with the Least-Cost Model, while adopting functional connectivity index (NL, NC, IIC, PC, and dIIL) to indicate the structural characteristics of green space network at varied distance thresholds. Results reveal that, on the whole, the distance threshold of 2,200 meters is most appropriate for the structure of the existing green space network of Haidian District, when 10 components and 353 linkages are identified and six important nodes and three important linkages that require a protection priority are further determined. Findings also disclose that the forest network of target tree species and that of water network of target water bird species are highly fragmented. Forest network serves in forms of dominant patch structure, local network structure, and fragmented cluster structure in the western mountainous area, the northern plain area, and the southeastern urban area, respectively. Moreover, the research proves that by introducing ten important linkages, the connectivity of forest network can be improved by 1.7 times, completing the overall structure in multiple directions and helping form a stable and resilient structure of the network. Finally, the research puts forward strategies for urban green space construction, including identifying construction objectives and target species, identifying and protecting important nodes and important linkages, and introducing possible important linkages and improving the structure of green space network, to help efficiently improve urban ecological quality.

Assessment of Green Infrastructure for Conservation Planning using Cadastral Data in Seoul, South Korea

Green infrastructure has been used for environmental conservation and management with many similar concepts such as green-space network, green-link network, and green-ways network based on the objectives of the cities for greening. Seoul established the 2030 Seoul City Master Plan that contains green-link network projects to connect critical green areas within the city. However, the plan does not have detailed analysis for the green infrastructure to incorporate land-cover information to many structural classes. This study maps green infrastructure networks of Seoul for complementing their green plans with identifying and ranking green areas. Hubs and links that are the main elements of green infrastructure have been identified through incorporating cadastral data of 967,502 parcels to 135 of land use maps using Geographic Information System. The study extracted 1,365 of green areas that represent an area of 24,530 ha within the city and buffered these areas to identify districts as critical green areas that have hubs and links. At a city scale, the study used 103,553 of parcel data for ranking extracted 20 districts, and 17,860 of parcel data for ranking extracted 42 links connecting the districts. At a district scale, this study used 87,826 of parcel data for analyzing the status of potential links within the districts and ranking these districts for green infrastructure. This assessment analyzes the main elements of green infrastructure and suggests site prioritization for green infrastructure under variable scenarios of green and developed areas in a metropolitan city.

Developing Green Infrastructure for Baghdad City

The public green spaces in Baghdad city have an obvious shortage and doesn’t fulfill and meet the needs of the population and the required open space criteria, moreover these green spaces are disjointed, disconnected and does not function as a unified system, that is why it suffers from neglect which contributes to deterioration of the city’s environment and increasing air pollution.
 Human beings depended on nature into providing clean air and good health, with the growth of the population and the urban areas, there has been negative influence on the natural environmental system. A new term lately appeared “Green Infrastructure”especially in the developed countries (USA, UK and other countries in Europe), as one form of solutions to conserve the natural environmental system of green and open spaces. Consequently this thesis depended on this new green space approach to solve the green spaces problem in Baghdad city and suggested new sites in different locations in the city to be a new green spaces connected to the existing green spaces in Baghdad. This will increase the public green space areas, accessibility to these areas and social cohesion, it will also contribute to the improvement of the city’s environment by reducing air pollution and reducing air temperature especially during the long summer season. Other economic benefits could be achieved by planning for a connected network of green spaces in Baghdad city as well.

Developing Green Infrastructure for Baghdad City

The public green spaces in Baghdad city have an obvious shortage and doesn’t fulfill and meet the needs of the population and the required open space criteria, moreover these green spaces are disjointed, disconnected and does not function as a unified system, that is why it suffers from neglect which contributes to deterioration of the city’s environment and increasing air pollution.
 Human beings depended on nature into providing clean air and good health, with the growth of the population and the urban areas, there has been negative influence on the natural environmental system. A new term lately appeared “Green Infrastructure”especially in the developed countries (USA, UK and other countries in Europe), as one form of solutions to conserve the natural environmental system of green and open spaces. Consequently this thesis depended on this new green space approach to solve the green spaces problem in Baghdad city and suggested new sites in different locations in the city to be a new green spaces connected to the existing green spaces in Baghdad. This will increase the public green space areas, accessibility to these areas and social cohesion, it will also contribute to the improvement of the city’s environment by reducing air pollution and reducing air temperature especially during the long summer season. Other economic benefits could be achieved by planning for a connected network of green spaces in Baghdad city as well.

Vegetation on and around large-scale buildings positively influences native tropical bird abundance and bird species richness

High population growth in the tropics is driving urbanisation, removing diverse natural ecosystems. This is causing native species to suffer while introduced synanthropes flourish. City planners are developing urban greenspace networks, in part trying to address this issue. Architects contribute to these greenspace networks by designing elevated and ground level green spaces on large-scale buildings. However, little evidence is available on whether building green spaces support native fauna. This is true for birds in tropical Singapore that support important ecosystem services and have existence value. Therefore, in this study, we conducted bird surveys and statistical analyses to determine, if and how vegetation on three building green space types (ground gardens, roof gardens and green walls) have a positive impact on native or introduced bird species. We found that elevated greenery (roof gardens and green walls) on large-scale buildings supported a higher richness of birds and abundance of urban native birds than control roofs and walls without vegetation. Ground gardens supported similar levels of native species as roof gardens but also a larger proportion of generalist synanthropes. However, we found no tropical forest habitat specialists across any space type. Therefore, we recommend roof gardens and ground gardens as a potential space for urban natives outside of a less competitive ground-level urban environment. Our study also found certain building design elements (height of elevated space, presence of specific plants) supported different species groups. Therefore, we suggest that these ecological requirements for different species groups are considered when designing a building’s green space.

Diachronic biodiversity analysis of a metropolitan area in the Mediterranean region

A study on urban plant diversity of Catania city (Sicily, Italy) was carried out through the analysis of urban green space network and natural habitats. The study area is extended to 939 km2 and includes 15 km of coastal habitat. Floristic data were used to analyze environmental changes. The vascular plant flora was investigated through a literature list for periods from 1889 to 1909 and from 1970 to 1990 and through an extensive survey campaign from 2010 to 2017. A total list of 927 species was acquired. Each species was associated with its own ecological and chorological information. Ellenberg's values were used as environmental indicators to assess the relationship between plant species and environmental factors.

Da Nang Green Space System Planning: An Ecology Landscape Approach

Under the pressure of rapid urbanization, the development of urban land in Vietnam has invaded green lands and had a negative impact on their ecosystems and environments. The new urban development not only does not improve the demand for green urban space but makes the living environment worse. Studying the design seriously and putting forward solutions for green urban space is essential and urgent. Taking Da Nang as a case study, planning a network of multicenter urban green space would change ecological principles to create a sustainable urban ecosystem. This is based on a landscape metrics method to reveal the green space system characteristics and its spatial distribution, area, density, and shape. A set of shapes index including categories such as SHAPE, mean distance (m) between each cell (GYRATE) and mean Euclidean distance neighbour (ENN) was used to display the geometrical shape of patches and continuity. These indices stress the difference in spatial structure in various land-use types. This article draws upon ecological landscape theory to propose a green system of urban regions including green space wedges, greenways, corridors, greenbelts and green additions; these factors help to create a sustainable urban green space.

Analyzing the Social-Ecological Network Characteristics of Green Space in City of Jeonju

There is growing interest in the various functions of urban green spaces that can improve urban resilience. Urban green spaces have an important role in wildlife habitat, climate and hydrological control, and recreation and outdoor activities. The connectivity of a green space network is known to control urban resilience by minimizing the disturbance caused by urbanization and climate change and strengthening the adaptation capacity. In this study, we analyzed the social-ecological network characteristics of green space in the city of Jeonju, South Korea. To analyze the ecological network, we defined wildlife habitat as the ecological node and used an index based on graph theory. We defined residential area as the social node, and we analyzed the accessibility of green space from the residential area to assess the social network. The results indicate that the green spaces in Jeonju are highly connected in the social and ecological perspectives on the fringe of the city. However, our founding also indicated that the social and ecological connectivity of the green space network in the downtown area should be improved. This study can be used as a basis for establishing an Urban Open Space Conservation Plan that considers the improvement of urban resilience in the future.

Moderately urbanized areas as a conservation opportunity for an endangered songbird

Urban sprawl has increased in Western Europe principally due to conversion of farmland areas, which has constrained remaining farmland to more intensive use. Urban densification aims to counteract urban sprawl; however, it threatens urban green spaces that act as sustainable alternative habitats for wildlife. In this study, we used the Common Redstart (Phoenicurus phoenicurus) as a model species to develop sustainable planning recommendations for urban green spaces. Using species distribution models (SDMs) in combinations with high-resolution predicting variables (2 × 2 m grid cell), we defined the suitable habitat of a Common Redstart territory in a moderately urbanized environment. We then predicted how the distribution would be affected under realistic scenarios of land-use modification (termed conservation scenario and threat scenario) in an effort to provide recommendations for urban green space planning. Tree canopy cover was the principal land-cover type in the SDMs that explained the current species distribution followed by impervious surface and short-cut lawn. In the conservation scenario where tree canopy coverage was increased we predicted an increase in optimum habitat for the Common Redstart from 7% to 27% of the study area. In contrast, under a threat scenario based on urban densification, we predicted a decrease in the optimum habitat to only 4% of the study area. The SDMs results were used to highlight the importance of the suitable areas that have a predicted potential to conserve and promote an interconnected urban green space networks to maintain urban biodiversity.

Adaptive Analysis of Green Space Network Planning for the Cooling Effect of Residential Blocks in Summer: A Case Study in Shanghai

The effect of Urban Heat Islands (UHIs) is becoming increasingly serious in cities. Research on the adaptive planning policies for microthermal environments at the residential block level of cities is thus becoming of greater significance. Based on the cooling effect of planning control elements in residential block areas, the element effects characteristics of water bodies and vegetation distribution on the thermal environment of residential blocks were analyzed by using ENVI-met software. The simulation data analysis showed that the combination of water bodies and vegetation had a synergistic cooling effect. Based on these results, simulations of five effective adaptive measures were carried out step by step in planning scenarios, that is, improving the water bodies with vegetation corridors, the application of high-albedo material on streets, and increasing the number of green patches, east-west green corridors, and north-south green corridors. The results were as follows. First, although each of the five optimization strategies have a certain degree of cooling effect on the entire block, the superposition of each factor had a synergistic effect. Second, different spatial optimization strategies had different cooling ranges for each subzone. The optimization of the north-south green corridor, green patches, and water features corridors were particularly significant for microclimate cooling. The east-west green corridor has a certain influence on a certain range of downwind zones and had an auxiliary cooling effect. The high-albedo material also had a weak overall decrease function for the thermal environment. Finally, the downwind area of the urban creek network had a great impact on cooling intensity, with distance attenuation characteristics; it was also proposed that the comprehensive cooling effect of the green space network with optimized layout was greater than that of any single green space element. The optimization scenario planning research provided a method for improving the scientific distribution of adaptation measures in urban residential blocks.

A stakeholder approach, door opener for farmland and multifunctionality in urban green infrastructure

During the last years Urban Green Infrastructure (UGI) has evolved as a research focus across Europe. UGI can be understood as a multifunctional network of different urban green spaces and elements contributing to urban benefits. Urban agriculture has gained increasing research interest in this context. While a strong focus has been made on functions and benefits of small scale activities, the question is still open, whether these findings can be up-scaled and transferred to the farmland scale. Furthermore, multifunctionality of urban and peri-urban agriculture is rarely being considered in the landscape context. This research aims to address these gaps and harnesses the question if agricultural landscapes – which in many European metropolitan regions provide significant spatial potential – can contribute to UGI as multifunctional green spaces. This work considers multifunctionality qualitatively based on stakeholder opinion, using a participatory research approach. This study provides new insights in peri-urban farmland potentials for UGI development, resulting into a strategy framework. Furthermore, it reflects on the role of the stakeholder involvement for `multifunctionality planning´. It suggests that it helps to define meaningful bundles of intertwined functions that interact on different scales, helping to deal with non-linearity of multiple functions and to better manage them simultaneously.