Black carbon (BC), a stable form of organic carbon (OC), is a byproduct of the incomplete combustion of biomass, biofuels, and fossil fuel. The main objectives of this research are to examine the spatial distribution of OC and BC in urban soil and determine the influence of tree canopy cover and landscape maintenance on soil carbon accumulation. Soil sampling was conducted at 29 sites throughout the City of Denton, Texas, in May 2019. Samples were collected from underneath post oak canopies and in adjacent open areas and were analyzed for total carbon (TC), total organic carbon (TOC), total N (TN), C:N ratio, and BC. Although maintenance levels had no significant effect, TOC was greater underneath trees (5.47%, 5.30 kg/m2) than lawns (3.58%, 4.84 kg/m2) at the surface 0-10 cm. Total nitrogen concentration was also greater underneath trees (0.43%) than lawns (0.31%) at the surface 0-10 cm. Preliminary results for BC were closely correlated to TOC. The lack of difference in C:N ratio between cover types indicates that leaf litter quality may not be the primary driving factor in soil C and N accumulation. Instead, differences in soil properties may be best explained by manual C inputs and greater atmospheric deposition of C and N to soils with tree canopy cover. Identifying patterns and potential drivers of soil OC and BC accumulation is important because soil carbon sequestration not only reduces atmospheric CO2, but also may provide additional pollution mitigation benefits, thereby contributing to a more sustainable urban environment.

Urban green space has been proven by the field of environmental psychology to have high value for human well-being. Green space is also important for biodiversity. However, the management of urban green space is commonly focused on present aesthetic values and not on the level of naturalness and its consequences for humans and biodiversity. This study compares the green space situation in relation to human well-being and biodiversity in Lviv, Ukraine and Stockholm, Sweden. By sampling urban green space gradients, from unnatural to natural, as well as collecting data about visiting people and bird taxa in those areas, comparisons between these two response variables and the level of naturalness were made. The results show correlations between the level of naturalness and the social structure of human visitors as well as to the bird taxa present. The results thus indicate that both human well-being and biodiversity is positively related to the level of naturalness of green space. Since more and more people live in urban areas decision-makers should leave sufficient amounts of green space, for the inhabitants’ well-being, both people and other species, in physical planning. Given generally low levels of green space in urban settings, areas for recreation and rehabilitation should be enhanced further.

As urban health challenges grow worldwide, the need for usable green space in cities also increases. Sedentary lifestyles, crowded urban areas, and the COVID-19 pandemic have all contributed to the need for more outdoor exercise space in recent years for all ages and communities. An assessment of green exercise space qualities and an identification of factors that determine how green spaces are used for exercise could lead to improved green spaces, increased use of those spaces and better overall physical activity and health outcomes for all population groups. Qualitative analysis of Malmö’s green exercise spaces examines the qualities of green spaces identified by the perceptions of residents in neighborhoods across the city, and then uses those perceptions in conjunction with determinants of green space use to find opportunities to make green spaces in the city more attractive and usable for exercise. Two interviews with officials from Malmö city government illustrate the city’s perspective of designing and creating green spaces. The determinants of use for green spaces are examined and analyzed based on the interview responses. These responses were analyzed using the Affordances and Determinants framework to find opportunities to make more high-quality use out of current green exercise spaces. A thematic analysis of city planning documents also provides longitudinal context to the topic. Barriers to accessibility and use of green exercise spaces were identified, as well as findings that would allow the city of Malmö to work more closely with residents to create usable green exercise spaces for all.

The last decades have been characterized by urbanization due to that the cities have widened and increased remarkably in number of inhabitants. The urbanization trend has led to a high pressure on land resources in the city. Many municipalities have therefore developed urban densification as a city development strategy. However, it is not uncommon that urban densification claims the green spaces as a suitable area in exploitation purpose. The reduced urban green areas have contributed to the valuable natural and cultural values are lost. To take compensatory measures of green spaces exploitation has therefore become an increasingly important tool for the modern urban planning. Though urban green spaces have a lot of positive effects in human health and for the environment, many municipalities in Sweden still do not have a strategy of the city greenery neither a strategy of compensation measures. This paper aims to investigate and to examine the extent to which compensation measures have been taken for a sample of zoning plans in the cities Umeå, Skellefteå and Piteå. The analysis is based on municipal guide lines of land and water use as well as the zoning plans and interviews with responsible officials in each city. To answer the questions to which compensation measures are used in exploitation of urban green areas and how the urban environment in each town has changed over time a literature study was made as well as a spatial overview in GIS and presentation of relevant data. The findings in this study shows that all the investigated cities have adopted a population goal that increases pressure on new housing. Neither of the studied zoning plans has applied adequate compensation measures even though the exploitation is planned on urban green spaces. Neither do any of the municipalities have a strategic approach for urban green areas despite the national authority Boverkets (2012) recommendation for achieving a sustainable urban planning in the present and in the future.

This study looks at the difference in accessibility to green spaces within the four largest Scottish cities. Having access to green spaces provides several physical and mental health benefits while also providing important ecosystem services. Previous studies show that the frequency of use of a green space declines once the distance surpasses 300 m to an access point. Geographic Information Systems (GIS) were used to analyse the service area of an access point to a green space, from which the rate of accessibility is established. The study also analyses the difference in accessibility between Euclidean and network distance. It is found that the Euclidean difference underestimates the distance needed to reach an access point and that 300 m recommendation by Euclidean distance is more closely resembles 500 m network distance. This study recommends that a distinction be made between which measurement metric is used when stating distances regarding accessibility, in order to create a more consistent approach.

Having a sight impairment should not limit one’s opportunity to be socially included and obtain the many benefits of being in a green space. It is a challenge for landscape architects to ensure that every green space is sensibly planned and designed to provide benefits to all users, including the visually impaired. However, to date, little research has explored the extent to which this group of people use their local green space and how the attributes of green space help to maintain or increase their sense of emotional well-being, especially when their vision loss occurs later in life. This study has drawn on a sample of visually impaired people with central vision loss caused by late onset Age-related Macular Degeneration (AMD) from across Scotland to address this research gap. Subjects ranged from being partially sighted to severely sight impaired or blind. It employed a mixed method research strategy with a quantitative method as the main approach, supplemented by qualitative methods and triangulation. The study began with focus group discussions aimed at identifying those green space attributes that this group of people deemed important, as a basis for developing a choice-based conjoint (CBC) questionnaire survey. The survey data were analysed using conjoint analysis software (Sawtooth Software version 8.3) with a Hierarchical Bayesian (HB) method to evaluate the relative importance of green space attributes to the study participants. The purpose of this method was to demonstrate the different priorities placed by people with visual impairment on the physical, social, sensory and accessibility attributes of the green space. This work was followed by a series of walk-along and home interviews to gain an in-depth understanding of how the attributes that emerged as most important from the conjoint survey helped the participants to obtain a restoration of their emotional well-being through being in green spaces. The conjoint analysis results demonstrated that the relative importance of green space attributes differs by gender, visual condition and the emotional state caused by sight loss. The qualitative findings suggest that green space can act as a medium to promote emotional restoration by offering a compatible environment that motivates individuals to undertake the kind of outdoor physical and social activities that reduce social isolation. Taken together, the two most influential factors in relative importance and emotional restoration were individual affordance and social company. The value of this research lies in identifying the landscape design attributes that are of the greatest importance to people with AMD. Such findings could help policymakers and landscape architects to provide better design solutions to include this group of people. They may also prove valuable as part of a new approach to enable people to deal with the emotional issues surrounding their late-onset visual impairment.

Urban green spaces are one of the layers of urban pattern. The urban environment is created through the complex relationships between natural, social, economic, and politic dynamics. Similar to the urban environment, as a produced landscape, characteristics of urban green spaces vary according to the social, economic, cultural and ecological context of urban society. In the last few decades, the &ldquo / quality of urban life target&rdquo / included in the sustainability approach, has became an important touchstone to increase the quality of urban environment in today&rsquo / s world / with its tendencies of covering of perpetual subjective values and in addition to objective conditions to identify &ldquo / individual&rsquo / s satisfaction&rdquo / as a target the by, of keeping its evaluation scope broad and holistic, and of deriving supporting the daily life practices which derive from participatory processes. Among the quality of life perspective, urban green spaces are interpretated in a holistic and broad framework in boundaries of their contributions to the inhabitants&rsquo / well-being through their physical, social, economic and ecological links with life in a broad scale spectrum ranging from individual level to city scale. In today&rsquo / s urban environment, Ankara&rsquo / s urban green spaces are planned by the responsible agents within a narrow framework / separated from urban and urban life, lacked of this multi-scale and multi-dimensional perspective, stucked in the sectoral targets of institutions. At this point, the study identifies the priorities and conditions to re-establish a well-functioned planning process for the green spaces of Ankara with a particular attention to quality of life.

While American cities are growing in size and population, they are losing one important group of people: children. Young people are essential to the vitality and social fabric of cities, yet cities are becoming increasingly unfriendly to young people and their families. Housing in cities is expensive, streets are devoted more to vehicles than pedestrians or bikes, and recreational space is not frequently convenient or adequate for the needs of children. While working to address any one of these needs would create greater equality for children, this report examines the impact of green recreational space for children. Adding green space to a city not only provides children with opportunities to play, which is vital to social, physical, and emotional development, but it also creates healthier communities with lower levels of crime and higher levels of community engagement. Creating spaces that are child-friendly and cherished by the community is not difficult, and can be achieved through deliberate planning and engagement with children. Due to recent downtown development initiatives, Austin has a unique opportunity to create green places for the community where children can play freely downtown. / text

Sustainable Development challenges will increasingly concentrate in cities as the urbanization in Europe and the rest of the world continues and governments must implement policies to ensure benefits of urban growths are shared sustainably. When more people move into the cities, the intimate contact with nature is lost since nature has not always been a priority in the history of urban planning. A biophilic approach is considered in this study, where the concept of inclusion of nature is perceived essential for the human life and previous empirical evidence supports the theory of presence of nature being substantial to human wellbeing. Because of the population density, Paris is an interesting example of the development of a megacity in a post-Kyoto context. The development project for the Paris urban area, called Le Grand Paris, intends to develop Paris on several levels. The aim with this study is to examine driving forces for nature as a part of an urban setting that can contribute to the development of intelligent sustainable urban planning for the future. Using qualitative methods to gather empirical data and a discourse analytical framework, this study intends to increase the understanding of perspectives, incentives and discords in the perceptions of urban green space and Sustainable Development. The problem statement is: How is urban green space carried out in the perspectives of cultural, economical and ecological values of citizens and planning documents in the context of Le Grand Paris project? The results establish that that need of increasing vegetation in the city of Paris is pressing in order to enhance quality of life and increase effects of ecological services. The continuing urbanization of Paris will intensify the need of social-ecological interactions, which require approaches through processes of democracy and participation in order to contribute to intra- and intergenerational socio-ecological justice for a sustainable Paris.

This thesis explores characteristics of loose space and their implications for physical activity. A space becomes loose when an individual is using it for something other than what it was intended. Individuals can pursue a range of physical activities not possible in other public spaces. To assess the compatibility between loose space and physical activity a survey of 27 users of loose space and key informant interviews from public health, municipal parks and landscape architecture disciplines were used. Interview findings suggest that unstructured forms of physical activity are more likely to be adopted and maintained while survey results show 70% of loose space users are achieving recommended physical activity levels. Multifunctional space that can accommodate appropriation and change may have design implications for improving health. Design recommendations and strategies were developed to inform the design and management of loose space for physical activity. This study suggests that the qualities and distribution of loose space could improve adoption and maintenance of physical activity.