Robert Klein , Elias Willberg , Silviya Korpilo , Tuuli Toivonen
{"title":"Temporal variation in travel greenery across 86 cities in Europe","authors":"Robert Klein , Elias Willberg , Silviya Korpilo , Tuuli Toivonen","doi":"10.1016/j.ufug.2024.128566","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The positive impacts of urban greenery on human health and wellbeing are well documented in scholarly literature. The focus has mostly been on residential greenery or availability and access to recreational green spaces. The importance of greenery in travel environments has received much less attention. Furthermore, little consideration has been given to temporal dynamics, although research suggests that greenery benefits are not uniformly distributed over different seasons or daytimes. In this study, we aimed to fill these knowledge gaps by systematically assessing travel and residential greenery in 86 European cities. Moreover, we quantified the impact of seasonality and variation in daytime length by using an open data approach at the pan-European level. First, we compared travel and residential greenery using monthly NDVI composites derived from high-resolution Sentinel-2 satellite imagery. In addition, we explored the temporal dynamics of greenery and adjusted NDVI values accordingly. The results demonstrated that travel environments have significantly lower greenery levels than residential environments in European cities. Overall, we found a latitudinal gradient from low to high travel greenery in southern Europe compared to Nordic cities. The findings also indicated that accounting for temporal variations, especially in northeastern Europe, has significant impact on the measured availability of travel greenery. We conclude that travel environment greenery and temporal variations should not be overlooked in exposure studies because they can lead to a biased understanding of greenery availability and related spatial disparities. Our findings can therefore serve as a methodological and policy benchmark for greening goals in European cities.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":49394,"journal":{"name":"Urban Forestry & Urban Greening","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":6.0000,"publicationDate":"2024-11-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Urban Forestry & Urban Greening","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1618866724003649","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The positive impacts of urban greenery on human health and wellbeing are well documented in scholarly literature. The focus has mostly been on residential greenery or availability and access to recreational green spaces. The importance of greenery in travel environments has received much less attention. Furthermore, little consideration has been given to temporal dynamics, although research suggests that greenery benefits are not uniformly distributed over different seasons or daytimes. In this study, we aimed to fill these knowledge gaps by systematically assessing travel and residential greenery in 86 European cities. Moreover, we quantified the impact of seasonality and variation in daytime length by using an open data approach at the pan-European level. First, we compared travel and residential greenery using monthly NDVI composites derived from high-resolution Sentinel-2 satellite imagery. In addition, we explored the temporal dynamics of greenery and adjusted NDVI values accordingly. The results demonstrated that travel environments have significantly lower greenery levels than residential environments in European cities. Overall, we found a latitudinal gradient from low to high travel greenery in southern Europe compared to Nordic cities. The findings also indicated that accounting for temporal variations, especially in northeastern Europe, has significant impact on the measured availability of travel greenery. We conclude that travel environment greenery and temporal variations should not be overlooked in exposure studies because they can lead to a biased understanding of greenery availability and related spatial disparities. Our findings can therefore serve as a methodological and policy benchmark for greening goals in European cities.
期刊介绍:
Urban Forestry and Urban Greening is a refereed, international journal aimed at presenting high-quality research with urban and peri-urban woody and non-woody vegetation and its use, planning, design, establishment and management as its main topics. Urban Forestry and Urban Greening concentrates on all tree-dominated (as joint together in the urban forest) as well as other green resources in and around urban areas, such as woodlands, public and private urban parks and gardens, urban nature areas, street tree and square plantations, botanical gardens and cemeteries.
The journal welcomes basic and applied research papers, as well as review papers and short communications. Contributions should focus on one or more of the following aspects:
-Form and functions of urban forests and other vegetation, including aspects of urban ecology.
-Policy-making, planning and design related to urban forests and other vegetation.
-Selection and establishment of tree resources and other vegetation for urban environments.
-Management of urban forests and other vegetation.
Original contributions of a high academic standard are invited from a wide range of disciplines and fields, including forestry, biology, horticulture, arboriculture, landscape ecology, pathology, soil science, hydrology, landscape architecture, landscape planning, urban planning and design, economics, sociology, environmental psychology, public health, and education.