Urban Green Environment Research Articles

Research on urban green environment and landscape design based on thermal energy cycle simulation and thermal image analysis

Research on urban green environment and landscape design based on thermal energy cycle simulation and thermal image analysis

Thermal energy environment cycle based on virtual image technology application in urban green environment space planning and design

Thermal energy environment cycle based on virtual image technology application in urban green environment space planning and design

Application of low energy building thermal energy optimization based on image recognition and light sensors in urban green environment planning

The paper analyzes the application of thermal energy optimization scheme based on image recognition and light sensor technology in low-energy buildings, in order to improve building energy efficiency, reduce energy consumption and provide scientific basis for urban green environment planning. In this paper, image recognition technology is used to monitor the light change in the external environment of the building, and the indoor light intensity data is obtained by the light sensor in real time. Combined with big data analysis, building heat optimization model is established, intelligent control system is designed, and the heating and cooling system of the building is dynamically adjusted, so as to achieve efficient use of heat energy. The experimental results show that the thermal energy optimization method based on image recognition and light sensor has a good application prospect in low-energy buildings, which not only effectively reduces energy consumption, but also contributes to the sustainable development of urban green environment.

Multiscale rooftop greening and its socioeconomic implications in Hong Kong

Rooftop greening stands as a distinctive approach to delivering green space without occupying ground-level areas. The spatial configuration of rooftop greenery and its socioeconomic associations are critical for sustainable urban development and environmental justice. However, historical research trends have predominantly concentrated on open, ground-level environments, neglecting the vertical manifestation of urban greenery. Investigations into green roofs have typically been circumscribed to their environmental benefits, while little attention has been paid to the spatial distribution of rooftop greenery and the drivers behind it. This study aims to fill the gap by implementing a multiscale mapping approach with satellite imagery to quantify rooftop greenness in Hong Kong. An integrated analysis incorporating geographic and demographic data reveals a correlation between rooftop greenness and factors such as income levels, housing types, residential area sizes, and household compositions. This association exhibits pronounced environmental inequality, where lower-income individuals, solitary residents, and households with smaller living spaces in densely populated and aged neighborhoods are deprived of rooftop green spaces, in contrast to their counterparts in more affluent neighborhoods. Government-subsidized public housing initiatives have significantly contributed to enhancing the green living environment for low-income families. Buildings administered by government have demonstrated exceptional performance in rooftop greening efforts. This evidence provides nuanced insights into the advantages and deficiencies of green roof planning in Hong Kong and could serve as a critical reference for other densely urbanized cities working towards a sustainable and equitable urban green environment.

Effects of simulated multi-sensory stimulation integration on physiological and psychological restoration in virtual urban green space environment.

Virtual urban green environment images and audio stimuli had been proven to have restorative effects on subjects' physical and mental health. In this area, researchers predominantly focused on visual, auditory and olfactory aspects, while tactile and gustatory senses have been minimally explored. However, the optimal combination of sensory stimuli for promoting physical and mental recovery remains unclear. Therefore, a simulated sensory stimulation approach involving 240 participants was employed, with 30 individuals included in each of the eight experimental groups: the visual-auditory (VA), visual-auditory-olfactory (VAO), visual-auditory-tactile (VAT), visual-auditory-gustatory(VAG), visual-auditory-olfactory-tactile (VAOT), visual-auditory-olfactory-gustatory (VAOG), visual-auditory-tactile-gustatory (VATG), and visual-auditory-olfactory-tactile-gustatory (VAOTG) groups. This study aimed to explore the differences in participants' physiological and psychological health recovery after exposure to different combinations of simulated sensory stimuli in virtual UGSs. The results indicated that the following: (1) In terms of physiological recovery, the blood pressure of the 8 experimental groups decreased significantly after the experiment, indicating that the virtual urban green space environment has a certain recovery effect on physiological state. The combination of VAOTG stimuli in the multisensory group resulted in the best blood pressure recovery (p < 0.05). Tactile is an important sense to enhance the physiological recovery effect. Olfactory-tactile or tactile-gustatory stimuli interactions significantly enhance physiological recovery, emphasizing the importance of tactile stimulation in improving physiological recovery. (2) In terms of psychological recovery, the common trigger of olfactory-gustatory is the most key element to enhance psychological recovery through multi-sensory stimulation of virtual urban green space environment. VAOG stimulation had the best effect on psychological recovery (p < 0.05), followed by VAOTG stimulation (p < 0.05). Gustatory is an important sense to enhance the psychological recovery effect, and both the tactile-gustatory interaction and the olfactory-gustatory interaction significantly enhance the recovery effect. At the same time, the psychological recovery effect obtained by four or more sensory combinations was higher than that obtained by two or three sensory stimulation groups. This study confirms more possibilities for ways to restore physical and mental health through virtual natural environments. It expands the research on the benefits of virtual nature experience and provides theoretical support for the application of this method.

Proposing Development of Community-based Physical Activity Park for Elderly Population of Pakistan.

Physical inactivity is known to be as performing less than 150 minutes of moderate- to vigorous-intensity physical activity per week. It poses a substantial risk for not only non-communicable, chronic diseases such as stroke, diabetes etc. but also contributes to the global mortality. Evidence suggests that the usual urban green environment is sturdily related to several health paybacks to the elderly population, which includes not only decreased cardiovascular mortality, Type 2 Diabetes risk, but overall improved physical, emotional, and mental health. It also invokes physical activity for community involvement, natural green curative sensory effect, spiritual boost, and leisure recreation to the elderly. Additionally, parks serve to perform activities like exercise, gardening, brisk walk or simply meditation in the natural environment. Unfortunately, in Pakistan, the urban green spaces like parks are scarce. Most people do not have access to well-designed parks. People over the age of 50 and above seem to be most affected by this deficiency. There is a need for specially designed parks that can address the challenges faced by elderly people while exercising. This study summarises the available evidence for designing special open area space in parks for the elderly population across Pakistan and highlights the need for further work to alleviate the global sickness of physical sedentariness among the elderly. Key Words: Older adults, Parks, Physical activity, Physical inactivity.

The influence of individual characteristics on perceived restorativeness and benefits associated with exposure to nature in a garden.

This study newly explored the relationship between individual characteristics (i.e., connectedness to nature, a preference for natural rather than built environments, personality, visuospatial preferences) with perceived restorativeness, as well as affective and memory-related benefits of exposure to the nature. Eighty adults were individually exposed to nature by walking in a landscape garden. Measures of connectedness to nature, preference for natural environments, personality traits, and visuospatial preferences were administered. Before and after walking in the garden, participants completed measures of affect (positive and negative emotions) and memory (short-term and working memory, and spatial memory). After walking they completed a Perceived Restorativeness scale. Perceived Restorativeness was found to be significantly explained by Extraversion (personality trait) and Connectedness to Nature. There was no significant influence of individual characteristics on benefits to affect and memory measures. Overall, the results showed that perception of the restorative effect of a natural environment is related to connectedness to nature and personality (extraversion trait). Taken together, our findings highlight the importance of considering individual characteristics to better capture restorative/recovery effects of a natural environment in an individual, and to tailor/implement nature-based solutions to ensure a sustainable urban green environment and to promote quality of life for their citizens.

A neuro-cognitive perspective on urban behavior of people with different moods

PurposeThis study aims to investigate the neurocognitive status of people with different moods (depressed and non-depressed) both in a typical urban environment (TUE) and in an urban green environment (UGE).Design/methodology/approachThe study was conducted with the participation of 210 individuals in a real environment. Heart rates of the participants were measured together with EEG and eye-tracking measurements while they were walking in a real urban environment (TUE and UGE). The participants were divided into depressed and non-depressed groups according to different moods. Movements within the city based on these two distinctions and different cognitive moods were investigated, together with the effects of the city plan on these people.FindingsAs a result, the green urban fabric was found to have a positive effect even on people with depression. Yet, it was found that the non-depressed group also spent more time in a green urban environment.Originality/valueThe study shows that urban planners and designers should assume an important role in the design of green spaces, which have a more intense visual and cognitive impact than structures.

Research on urban applications based on the development of UA Vs technology

With the continuous development of social economy, urbanization activities and urban three-dim ensional and integrated transportation network can achieve rapid development, and the high flexibility and ti meliness of UAVs are more widely recognized. Active development of UAVs to improve sustainable urban transportation and enhance urban green environment.

Design of Urban Garden Landscape Visualization System Based on GIS and Remote Sensing Technology.

Urban green ecological space is an important manifestation of the environmental characteristics of a green city. The research results show that the urban green ecological space has obvious cooling and humidity effects, which are very important for reducing the urban heat island effect. Remote sensing technology describes the slow-release effects of urban green parks in different seasons from the two perspectives of thermal slow-release intensity and thermal slow-release distance. In this paper, UAV remote sensing is used to extract the internal and external factors of the urban green environment characteristics and to identify the main factors that affect the slow-release heat effect and seasonal changes of the urban green environment. In addition, it analyzes the factors that affect the urban environmental temperature within the environmental temperature slow-release range of urban green space, establishes a model to predict the environmental temperature within the thermal slow-release range outside the park, and realizes the largest thermal slow release in the urban greening ecological space. These are new technologies created in the context of digitization, which include image understanding and synthesis, which involve the use of computer graphics and image processing technology to convert data into graphics or images displayed on the screen to achieve an interactive process.

Impacts of Urban Development on Regional Green Development Efficiency—A Case of the Yangtze River Delta in China

Green development is a significant concept that cannot be ignored in contemporary society. However, in the context of China’s transition from high-speed growth to high-quality development, the complex impact of urban development has brought great challenges to the urban green environment. In this paper, the impact of urban development on green development efficiency (GDE) was studied. First and foremost, a Super-SBM model was introduced to measure the GDE of 41 cities in the Yangtze River Delta during 2009–2018. Moreover, a Tobit model was used to analyze the correlation between four urban development factors, including economic development and GDE. According to the results, the mean GDE of the Yangtze River Delta is 0.824, and the GDE in most cities there has shown a fluctuating growth trend in this decade. By comparison, the GDEs of coastal cities and cities in the southeast of the Yangtze River Delta were generally higher than those of cities in the north, indicating that the green development is geographically unbalanced, and there is spatial heterogeneity in the area studied. The study’s results also suggest that the urban economic development, innovation level, and government planning play a significant role in stimulating urban green development, and that the expansion of urban construction area hinders the improvement of GDE.

Green Spaces and Urban Liveability in Sub-Saharan Africa: Lessons from Bafoussam I, Cameroon

Urban green spaces support the development of cities in diverse ways. Considerable work has been done in recent years exploring the value of urban green space for health and wellbeing of urban centres across the world and in Sub-Saharan African countries in particular. This study is designed to examine the contribution of green spaces to city liveability in Bafoussam I Council. Data for the study were obtained through primary and secondary sources using a mixed design method of inquiry which combines both quantitative and qualitative approaches to explore data on urban green spaces in Bafoussam I. Purposive and simple random sampling techniques were used to select households for questionnaire administration. The data engendered were analyzed with descriptive and inferential statistics. The outcomes indicated that green spaces have significantly contributed to the health and wellbeing of the city dwellers in Bafoussam I Council. The main actors responsible for green spaces management in the municipality include government agencies, Bafoussam City Council, Municipal Council, the civil society, and Non-Governmental Organizations. In line with the 2022 African Nations Cup (AFCON) in Cameroon, this city-centre beautification has been stepped up. The Pearson moment Correlation used to test the hypothesis indicated a strong positive correlation at a calculated P-value .001, thus, green spaces have significant effects on the health and wellbeing of urban dwellers in Bafoussam I. The study concluded by emphasizing that stakeholders of green spaces in the municipality need to collaborate to take effective decisions that can be sustainable to ensure protection and equitable management of urban green environment to meet the need of the future generations in line with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 11.

Local color and morphological image feature based vegetation identification and its application to human environment street view vegetation mapping, or how green is our county?

ABSTRACT Measuring the amount of vegetation in a given area on a large scale has long been accomplished using satellite and aerial imaging systems. These methods have been very reliable in measuring vegetation coverage accurately at the top of the canopy, but their capabilities are limited when it comes to identifying green vegetation located beneath the canopy cover. Measuring the amount of urban and suburban vegetation along a street network that is partially beneath the canopy has recently been introduced with the use of Google Street View (GSV) images, made accessible by the Google Street View Image API. Analyzing green vegetation through the use of GSV images can provide a comprehensive representation of the amount of green vegetation found within geographical regions of higher population density, and it facilitates an analysis performed at the street-level. In this paper we propose a fine-tuned color based image filtering and segmentation technique and we use it to define and map an urban green environment index. We deployed this image processing method and, using GSV images as a high-resolution GIS data source, we computed and mapped the green index of Milwaukee County, a 3,082 urban/suburban county in Wisconsin. This approach generates a high-resolution street-level vegetation estimate that may prove valuable in urban planning and management, as well as for researchers investigating the correlation between environmental factors and human health outcomes.

Dietary Habits of Wintering Pale Thrush Turdus pallidus in the Urban Green Environment of Subtropical Okinawa-Jima Island, Japan

Knowledge of the feeding behavior of omnivorous migrant birds is important to understand their migration ecology. This study revealed the dietary habits of the Pale Thrush Turdus pallidus overwintering on Okinawa-jima Island, Japan. Food items consumed were determined from the contents of the gizzards of 32 birds; at least 24 animal and eight plant species were identified. The contents of 84.4% of the studied gizzards were dominated by a single species or item. The Pale Thrush forages on various animals and plants, but in its winter habitat it feeds extensively and exclusively on select food items within a short period.

Association between Green Space and Pregnancy Outcomes: A Case-Study in Temuco, Chile. Preliminary Results

A rapidly growing body of research has recently shown beneficial health effect of urban green environment and natural spaces. Latin America is the world&amp;#8217;s most urbanized region, with largest social and economic inequities, facing important challenges in city design, and availability of green spaces. Here, we examine the association between residential surrounding greenness and pregnancy outcomes in a Temuco, a mid-size city in Chile. To our knowledge, this is the first study of this kind in Latin America.A retrospective cohort is being conformed using pregnancy records from the main public Hospital in Temuco during 2009 &amp;#8211; 2016, including sociodemographic and medical inputs. Pregnancy outcomes included: preeclampsia and gestational diabetes, for the mother; and preterm birth, low birth weight, term birth weight, small for gestational age, birth weight, gestational age and head circumference, for the newborn. Home address was georeferenced using the Google map geocoding API. Greenness was estimated for each address by using the NDVI from satellite data in buffers of 100, 300 and 500m. Separate logistic multivariate models were fitted for each outcome adjusted for potential confounders. Effects were estimated for changes in one interquartile range (IQR) in surrounding greenness.From expected 16,000 total records, preliminary results are shown for the first 9800 (2009-2013). Overall, analyses show decreased risks of gestational diabetes (OR 0.97 IC95% 0.85 &amp;#8211; 1.10 for 300m buffer), preterm birth (OR 0.94 IC95% 0.78 &amp;#8211; 1.15 for 300m buffer), low birth weight (OR 0.94 IC95% 0.77 &amp;#8211; 1.16 for 300m buffer), and small for gestational age (OR 0.99 IC95% 0.86 &amp;#8211; 1.13 for 300m buffer) associated with an IQR increase in NDVI.Preliminary findings point to beneficial impact of surrounding greenness in fetal growth, although not reaching statistical significance. Analysis will be repeated once data entry is complete (end of April).

Street-scale green infrastructure and physical activity

Introduction: Urban roadside nature, an important component of ecosystem services, provides the opportunity for individuals to experience the natural world while going about their everyday lives. Despite mounting evidence that green space can improve health and health determinants, these studies are often limited with respect to the spatial resolution of analysis. This study examines the association between green infrastructure with active transportation and recreational activity using fine-scale estimates of the urban green environment. Methods: Percent green space and tree cover along walkable roads was calculated using 1-meter resolution land cover data within 500 and 1000 meter network buffers around study participants’ homes. Data on self-reported physical activity were from a prospective cohort of survey respondents residing in Milwaukee and Green Bay, WI (n=752). Logistic regression was used to assess the association between neighborhood environment and physical activity, adjusting for socio-demographics, duration of residence, intersection density, and neighborhood destinations and economic hardship index. Results: Greater than 35% green space along walkable roads within 500 and 1000 meter buffers doubled the odds of recreational physical activity at least once within a 30 day window (adjusted odds ratio (AOR)=2.0, p=0.03, 95% CI: 1.1, 3.9 and AOR=2.2, p=0.04, 95% CI: 1.0, 4.6 respectively). Study participants with greater than 15% tree cover along walkable roads within 500 and 1000 meters of their homes had approximately 1.5 times greater odds of choosing active transportation once than those with less tree cover (AOR=1.5, p=0.22, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.8, 2.9 and AOR=1.5, p=0.35, 95% CI: 0.7, 3.3 respectively). Conclusions: These findings suggest that the proximate neighborhood environment may influence an individual’s decision to exercise for recreation and potentially transportation, however, more work on neighborhood preference is needed.

Cities, the Urban Green Environment, and Individual Subjective Well-Being: The Case of Milan, Italy

This paper evaluates the independent effect of the spatial proximity of green urban areas upon the individual subjective well-being of the Milan population (Italy). The methodology is based on a survey undertaken in 2010 using a sample of 1,000 of Milan citizens. Univariate and multivariate analyses and GIS localization have been employed in order to rank the major individual well-being determinants and the relationship between citizens and urban green areas. Results show that the residential proximity of citizens to urban green areas seems to have little bearing on individual subjective well-being.

THE IMPORTANCE OF GREEN SPACE: TOWARDS A QUALITY LIVING ENVIRONMENT IN URBAN AREAS Dzarul

This paper considers the preference of residents, living in urban areas with low to high percentage of greenery coverage in correlation with the household income. This paper would serve as a background study to investigate the resident’s view on the “quality” of their residential streets and their residential areas. It would be focused on what the residents consider as the important factors that makes a “high quality” residential street environment and what are the important factors in creating a “good” place to live. The study proposed to be undertaken in Kuala Lumpur, the national capital city of Malaysia at four selected residential district ranging from underprivileged to affluent neighborhood areas. Samplings would be based on gender, age, ethnicity, education and occupation to identify any significant differences present between the groups, in order to determine the issues that could be taken into account for future provision, planning and management. This study would explore the resident’s attitude towards street trees and residential gardens as part of the urban green space environment towards their conceptions of urban quality of life in the selected neighborhood residential areas.

都市緑地における変形菌（真性粘菌）の環境指標生物としての可能性

The myxomycetes are eulcaryotic unicellular organism. They live in forest floor and feed on micro-organisms such as bacteria, molds, algae and protozoa that inhabit soil, fallen leaves or rotten wood. They make spores and spores are scattered from a fruit body by the wind. When a spore falls in a suitable place for germination, its spore buds and grows. This study aims to develop how to use the myxomycetes as a bio-indicator showed the quality of the urban green environment. The results showed that 222 kinds of the myxomycetes occurred in 35 urban green in Tokyo. For this reason, it reveals that a number of the myxomycetes live in narrow or isolated urban green. Twelve kinds of the myxomycetes were found in investigation at Showa Memorial Park. The myxomycetes lives in the secondary forest covered with fallen leaves and rotten wood, but we couldnt find them in the forest which ground is hard or grassed down. According to the results derived in our study and other reference, it needs study to put the myxomycetes as bio-indicator to practical use, example observations of life and case of environmental education or museum exhibit about the myxomycetes. However, we appreciate the myxomycetes as new bio-indicator of urban green environment because of the advantage that if there is a suitable place for living, the myxomycetes can live in urban green because spores of the myxomycetes are scattered by the wind.