Paul Brindley

Urban canal-edge spaces are increasingly recognised as important blue–green infrastructure for mitigating urban heat; however, the mechanisms governing pedestrian thermal comfort in these environments remain insufficiently understood. This study employed a validated ENVI-met model to investigate the effects of canal orientation, canal width, water bodies and riparian tree configuration on pedestrian thermal comfort under summer heatwave conditions in Manchester, UK. A total of 32 scenarios were simulated to quantify the individual and combined effects of these design factors. Canal water alone provided only moderate daytime cooling, with its effectiveness depending strongly on canal orientation and local ventilation conditions. In contrast, riparian trees substantially improved thermal comfort through reductions in mean radiant temperature associated with canopy shading. Furthermore, the study identified that thermal performance was influenced not simply by the presence of blue and green infrastructure, but by their interaction. Rather than acting as the dominant cooling source, canal water enhanced the cooling effectiveness of adjacent vegetation, while continuous canopy shading emerged as the principal mechanism controlling pedestrian thermal comfort. These findings provide new insights into the mechanisms of canal-edge cooling and offer quantitative evidence to support climate-responsive design of thermally comfortable and resilient urban waterfronts.

With the intensification of climate change and the urban heat island effect, there is growing awareness of the role of urban greening in improving the urban climate. The aim of this study is to explore how various characteristics of green spaces—including type, configuration (size and shape), location, and distance from the urban centre—affect their cooling effect. Landsat remote sensing land surface temperature data were analysed through Geographic Information Systems, using Sheffield as a case study. The results show that the cooling effect of woodland was significantly stronger than that of grassland and urban parks, with a cooling intensity reaching up to 2.93 °C, and a cooling extent that can reach up to 500 m beyond its boundary. When closer to the city centre, both the shape and size of green spaces show a positive correlation with their cooling effect, but this relationship becomes less evident as the distance from the city centre increases. The size of a woodland had a greater effect in terms of a reduction in land surface temperature than the shape of the woodland. The findings of this study can provide a better framework for landscape architects and urban planners to plan for climate change and propose stronger green strategies to mitigate the urban heat island effect.

Understanding landscape fragmentation is crucial to explore comprehensive land-use–land-cover (LULC) change within fast-growing urbanisation. While LULC change is a global concern, limited research explores landscape fragmentation along river and road infrastructure in high-density riverine contexts. This study addresses this gap through understanding dynamic landscape fragmentation patterns to track LULC in the Ciliwung River, Indonesia, from 1990 to 2020. The research employed remote sensing, GIS, R programming with Landsat data, Normalised Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) values, buffering, and landscape metrics. The findings show minimal fragmentation was concentrated downstream near Jakarta, while significant fragmentation, manifesting as green loss, occurred in the midstream. Buffer analysis showed high green loss in the upstream segment both near the river and roads, particularly within a 0–400 m buffer. However, landscape metrics identified changes in the midstream close to the river buffer (0–200 m) indicating that riparian green spaces in this area persist as relatively large but ecologically unconnected “chunks”. The stability of these remaining patches makes them a crucial asset for targeted restoration. These findings contribute to a deeper understanding of how river and road networks influence the change, highlighting the integral role of remote sensing and GIS in monitoring LULC change for natural preservation.

Children’s playgrounds are an important component providing opportunities for children’s play. Few studies, however, have explored the unequal geographic provision of these valuable spaces. This work addressed this research gap by identifying the key data and methods required to analyse children’s playground provision at both global and national geographic scales. The aims of the paper were twofold: It firstly explored the potential for mapping children’s playground provision at a global scale and validated such an approach using finer spatial scales. Secondly, the unequal provision of playgrounds was investigated at a national scale in England, UK using open data sources. Relationships with the size of the settlement and deprivation were also explored. The work used a range of secondary datasets through applying quantitative GIS and statistical approaches. The results demonstrated that, due to data quality issues, a world approach to map playground provision was not currently viable. At a national scale, results highlighted substantial inequality in provision, with some settlements in England experiencing five times the number of children per playground, despite being broadly comparable in terms of population. Deprived settlements in England tended to have fewer, smaller, and further-away playgrounds. The patterns were most stark in the largest settlements. London, however, was consistently an exception to these patterns, where deprived areas tended to have more and closer playgrounds. Acknowledging the numerous competing different metrics to measure provision of children’s playgrounds, the research generated a framework for bringing together a wide range of interrelated data into a condensed form for comparison. Thus, the approach facilitated the identification of interventions within different contexts in order to reduce inequalities in playground provision and bolster children’s democratic right to the city for play.

Green infrastructure plays a vital role in urban ecosystems. This includes sustaining biodiversity and human health. Despite a large number of studies investigating greenspace disparities in suburban areas, no known studies have compared the green attributes (e.g., trees, greenness, and greenspaces) of urban centres. Consequently, there may be uncharacterised socioecological disparities between the cores of urban areas (e.g., city centres). This is important because people spend considerable time in urban centres due to employment, retail and leisure opportunities. Therefore, the availability of––and disparities in––green infrastructure in urban centres can affect many lives and potentially underscore a socio-ecological justice issue. To facilitate comparisons between urban centres in Great Britain, we analysed open data of urban centre boundaries with a central business district and population of ≥100,000 (n = 68). Given the various elements that contribute to ‘greenness’, we combine a range of different measurements (trees, greenness, and accessible greenspaces) into a single indicator. We applied the normalised difference vegetation index (NDVI) to estimate the mean greenness of urban centres and the wider urban area (using a 1 km buffer) and determined the proportion of publicly accessible greenspace within each urban centre with Ordnance Survey Open Greenspace data. Finally, we applied a land cover classification algorithm using i-Tree Canopy to estimate tree coverage. This is the first study to define and rank urban centres based on multiple green attributes. The results suggest important differences in the proportion of green attributes between urban centres. For instance, Exeter scored the highest with a mean NDVI of 0.15, a tree coverage of 11.67%, and an OS Greenspace coverage of 0.05%, and Glasgow the lowest with a mean NDVI of 0.02, a tree cover of 1.95% and an OS Greenspace coverage of 0.00%. We also demonstrated that population size negatively associated with greenness and tree coverage, but not greenspaces, and that green attributes negatively associated with deprivation. This is important because it suggests that health-promoting and biodiversity-supporting resources diminish as population and deprivation increase. Disparities in green infrastructure across the country, along with the population and deprivation-associated trends, are important in terms of socioecological and equity justice. This study provides a baseline and stimulus to help local authorities and urban planners create and monitor equitable greening interventions in urban/city centres.

Urban green space (UGS) provides a range of services to visitors and is particularly important for recreation and well-being. There are a number of approaches to research visitor accessibility, but implications for demographic differences of users are typically ignored. In order to more precisely model usage of UGS regarding visitor preference, this study used Guangzhou (China) as a case study, concentrating on residents’ visitation to parks and their factors across different groups (for example, by gender, education level, age and visiting frequency). Online questionnaires from 2360 adults were collected on visiting preferences, such as traveling time, visiting frequency, visit duration within parks, visiting reasons and barriers. Results indicate that women were less likely than men to undertake longer walking trips to access parks (over 40 min). Elderly people tended to have longer visit durations, and lower-educated people tended to have shorter visiting times (particularly less than 15 min) in parks. Visit duration in parks had a positive association with walking time and a negative association with visiting frequency. Furthermore, the proportion of people visiting parks to relieve stress declined with increasing age. Infrequent park users (visiting parks less than once a month) rarely visited to gain inspiration or to socialize with strangers. Barriers to use of parks were correlated with socio-demographic factors, highlighting that older people identified poor quality of parks and long walking times as critical barriers. This study provides evidence that there is no one-size-fits-all modeling approach for UGS usage; instead, it demonstrates the importance of considering the socio-demographic characteristics of users.