Urban Planning and Green Spaces: Balancing Development and Nature in Cities
Sourced from AZO Build
The way in which green spaces are incorporated into cities and urban spaces requires careful planning to make the best of the space without impeding development, and is unique to the issues and challenges faced by the individual city and its inhabitants. This article will discuss some of the primary methods of incorporating green spaces into urban planning and their key benefits.
Green spaces in cities are beneficial to human health, both physical and mental, providing areas where people can partake in exercise and relaxation while also promoting benefits related to dissipated noise and chemical pollution. While urban spaces represent only around 2% of global land use, the majority of the population in developed countries live in them, around 80% in North America, 75% in Europe, and approximately 40% in Asia. Developing regions are rapidly closing the gap, however, and Asia is predicted to house around 60% of the world’s urban population by 2050. Concerningly, due to a lack of natural drainage and the presence of large flat paved areas, urban zones are more prone to flooding, which in association with enhanced intensity of precipitation in some regions associated with climate change, is causing more frequent and costly flood events.
How Do Green Spaces Combat Pollution?
Urban areas are associated with high carbon dioxide, volatile organic compounds, and particulate matter concentrations that are capable of impacting human health negatively, as well as the former contributing to global warming. In association, large surface areas of concrete and other building materials absorb and reflect heat back into the atmosphere, contributing to local warming and facilitating the formation of tropospheric ozone.
During photosynthesis, plants consume carbon dioxide and produce oxygen, then respire by consuming oxygen and producing carbon dioxide at night, though to a lesser extent. In any case, carbon dioxide levels spike significantly during peak traffic times in the day, and thus trees act as a carbon sink in the immediate environment. Further, particulate matter settles on the large surface area of trees, which are then washed by rain and renewed by growth. This acts to lessen the concentration of particulate matter in the air, which would otherwise be breathed in by humans or settle on buildings or other property.
Green spaces, in particular those with multiple trees and other large plants bearing foliage, are frequently utilized in noise reduction during urban planning and redevelopment. Environmental noise pollution is a significant issue in many urban areas, the vast majority typically originating from traffic. Trees absorb, reflect, and refract noise, largely via leaves acting as baffles to incoming sound waves, though also due to the trunk and branches acting as solid barriers. Noise reductions as high as 25%, amounting to 5 – 10 dB, are often reported following the planting of roadside trees, as measured from an objective distance.
From the Living Architecture Monitor
