Beyond urban parks: Mapping informal green spaces in an urban–peri-urban gradient

• Biernacka, Magdalena ^[1] ; Kronenberg, Jakub ^[1] ; Łaszkiewicz, Edyta ^[1] ; Czembrowski, Piotr ^[3] ; Amini Parsa, Vahid ^[1] ; Sikorska, Daria ^[2]
  1. [1] University of Łódź

     University of Łódź

     Łódź, Polonia

     
  2. [2] Warsaw University of Life Sciences

     Warsaw University of Life Sciences

     Warszawa, Polonia

     
  3. [3] Digica Company, 143 Wólczańska Street, 90-525 Łódź, Poland

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• Localización: Land use policy: The International Journal Covering All Aspects of Land Use, ISSN 0264-8377, ISSN-e 1873-5754, Nº. 131, 2023
• Idioma: inglés
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  • Urban green space (UGS) is a broad and potentially very inclusive term. Although most discussions on UGS focus on urban parks, there are many other vegetated areas in cities. Many are not formally recognised and protected, hence they are called informal green spaces (IGS), and yet they provide ecosystem services similar to parks. Based on a detailed overview of the different categories of UGS, we shed new light on how the different categories of UGS are included in urban planning and provide a snapshot of the disturbing urban land use transition – from UGS to other uses – which is partly related to the lack of formal recognition of IGS. The novelty in our study is that we mapped and analysed all UGS in our case study area, following two rivers that cut through Lodz (Łódź), Poland – from one peri-urban area (partly rural), through the city centre, to the peri-urban area on the other side of the city. The urban structures and the gradient of buildings in the studied area coincide with the urban structures for the whole of Lodz; therefore, our research area is a representative part of the city and its heterogeneity. Out of the seventeen UGS categories we distinguished, only six are formally recognised and account for 24% of all areas covered by UGS. Only 7% of the area we identified as UGS is designated as different types of vegetated areas according to local zoning plans. The analysis highlights broader challenges related to the planning and management of urban green and blue infrastructures.