Lessons from the Pandemic: Equitable Urban Nature
By JD Brown & Meredith Hoos
January 19, 2021
As part of an ongoing series, we will examine what the pandemic has taught us about nature in cities. Today, we begin, in the first of a two-part post, with the priority to create more equitable nature in cities. Part 1 will examine the history and evidence of inequity and how the pandemic has only exacerbated these inequities. Part 2 will follow with an introduction to projects and programs arising in response to the pandemic that reach for a more equitable future for nature in cities.
Priority No. 1: Create More Equitable Urban Nature
A critical starting point in planning and designing better cities is to address the deep inequities in the presence of and access to nature across the urban landscape. Important research within the last year has illustrated the inequities that exist in tree canopy coverage across city neighborhoods, the dramatic differential impact this can have for urban heat within a single area of the city, and the correlation of these inequities to historically racist planning practices. Consequences of these discriminatory planning practices continue to affect communities of color today and include: increased levels of air pollution; higher ambient temperatures; greater exposure to toxic industrial practices; and less access to environmental resources like public green spaces.
The pandemic has exacerbated the inequities at the intersection of race and access to urban nature. As the pandemic continues to isolate residents, green space is continuing to prove a valuable, but privileged, resource. Even where public parks are available, perception of park accessibility and city investment in local parks influences who is actually benefiting from urban green space. Improved access is not simply a question of park proximity, but also a question of the quality of these spaces and existence of psychological barriers to use by all communities.
In a survey of New York City residents by the Urban Systems Lab, responses indicated that level of accessibility varied depending on where respondents lived within the city’s borough system. The results are not only indicative of the patterns of unequal green space distribution, size and surroundings, and maintenance levels, but should make us reflect on what park access means for diverse communities.
The culture that surrounds the distribution and investment in green spaces is cut from the same cloth that produced today's segregated neighborhoods and biased system of justice. Green space inequity is an important reminder that racism still pervades public spaces. The pandemic has exacerbated these inequities but, as we discuss in part 2, the pandemic has also accelerated the introduction of interventions to begin to address them.
Evidence of Inequity
Inequitable access to high quality urban nature has been a subject of research for several decades. Pre-pandemic studies found that, while pure proximity (in terms of distance to parks) may not be as inequitably dispersed, there is pronounced inequity in terms of access to higher quality nature in the form of parks that are larger and not over-crowded, have greater tree canopy coverage, better maintenance and safer conditions (Rigolon 2016). One study from the Trust for Public Land concluded that parks serving majority nonwhite populations were, on average, half as large and five times more crowded.
This past July, a Center for American Progress report documented the extent to which families of color have less access to nature in the form of nearby forest, streams and wetlands. Communities of color are three times more likely to live in nature deprived areas. The report recommends diverse objectives to address these inequities, which include not only improving the distribution of nature, but also facing head-on the history and persistent practices of exclusion, such as the under representation of nonwhite voices in the conservation community.
Addressing these inequities can often create unintended impacts. When cities improve the presence of and access to nature, communities can be displaced through increased housing costs (Wolch et al. 2014). Accordingly, authors have proposed a “just green enough” strategy that marries improvements to nature infrastructure with efforts to address other priorities of existing communities, such as food access and job development (Curran & Hamilton 2012). Instead of a whole-scale conversion of areas for large scale parks, the potential to avoid eco-gentrification may lie in the smaller scale interventions that are well dispersed and designed in combination with other resources, such as employment and home ownership support. With the aim that the community in place is the one best served by new nature-based improvements.
Cully Park. Image by Tim Beatley.
Pandemic Spotlight on Inequity
The pandemic has brought a focused lens on nature inequity in cities. When social distancing has resulted in decreased park access or even park closures, the communities without access to “private” nature are the most heavily impacted. While the pandemic has been heralded for ushering in a new wave of home gardening and appreciation for the nature in our own backyards, not everyone has such amenities. While more affluent residents can still access green space in private gardens and tree lined avenues, there are many who are not so fortunate. In this respect, maybe more than ever before, maintaining publicly accessible nature becomes a critical resource for individual and collective health and well-being.
The failure to consider that restrictions on park access will have unequal impacts only serves to exacerbate existing inequities with real health consequences for communities without equitable access. Further, during the pandemic, there has been a trend to exclude visitors to communities with nature destinations like public beaches, which places those searching for access to nature beyond the boundaries of a community without adequate nature access in a bind.
In these respects, not only has the pandemic made bare what should already be apparent but has also hastened the need to address these inequities. In Part 2 of this post, we will highlight some of the efforts underway to address this critical need.
Part 1 Resources:
Curran, W., & Hamilton, T. (2012). Just green enough: Contesting environmental gentrification in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Local Environment, 17, 1027–1042. doi: 10.1080/13549839.2012.729569.
González, J. (April 16, 2020). Park closures have unequal costs. High Country News.
Gordan, A. (April 22, 2020). The Fight for Greener Neighborhoods Is a Matter of Life or Death. Vice.
Hoffman, J., Shandas, V. and Pendleton, N. (2020). The Effects of Historical Housing Policies on Resident Exposure to Intra-Urban Heat: A Study of 108 US Urban Areas. Climate. 8(12). doi:10.3390/cli8010012.
Lanham, J.D. (Sept. 22, 2016). Birding While Black. Literary Hub.
Li, C.A. (April 22, 2020). Social Distancing and the Privilege of Green Space. Age of Awareness.
Lopez, B.; Kennedy, C.; McPhearson, T (2020). Parks are Critical Urban Infrastructure: Perception and Use of Urban Green Spaces in NYC During COVID-19. Preprints. 2020080620. doi: 10.20944/preprints202008.0620.v2.
Moore, S. (Aug. 9, 2020). Park Inequities Are Symptoms of a Bigger Problem. Healthy Places by Design.
Perrino, J. (July 2, 2020). “Redlining” And Health Indicators: Decisions Made 80 Years Ago Have Health Consequences Today. NRCR.
Prevost, L. (Aug. 6, 2020). Restricting Beach Access to Residents Only. The New York Times.
Rayman, J. and Goodier, M. (July 3, 2020). Covid-19 is highlighting cities’ unequal access to green space. City Monitor.
Richards, M. (September 19, 2020). Who Benefits from Public Green Space? Scientific America.
Rigolon, A. (2016). A complex landscape of inequity in access to urban parks: A literature review. Landscape and Urban Planning. 153: 160-169. doi: 10.1016/j.landurbplan.2016.05.017.
Rowland-Shea, J., Doshi, S., Edberg, S. and Fanger, R. (July 21, 2020). The Nature Gap. Center for American Progress.
Sefcik, J. S., Kondo, M. C., Klusaritz, H., Sarantschin, E., Solomon, S., Roepke, A., South, E. C., & Jacoby, S. F. (2019). Perceptions of Nature and Access to Green Space in Four Urban Neighborhoods. International journal of environmental research and public health. 16(13), 2313. doi: 10.3390/ijerph16132313.
Wen, M., Zhang, X., Harris, C.D., Holt, J.B., Croft, J.B., (2013). Spatial disparities in the distribution of parks and green spaces in the USA. Annals of Behavioral Medicine. 45(1), 18-27. doi: 10.1007/s12160-012-9426-x.
Wilson, K. (Aug. 10, 2020). Study: Parks in Non-White Neighborhoods Are Half As Large and 5x As Crowded. StreetsBlog USA.
Wolch, J. R., Byrne, J., & Newell, J. P. (2014). Urban green space, public health, and environmental justice: the challenge of making cities just green enough. Landscape and Urban Planning, 125, 234–244. doi:10.1016/j.landurbplan.2014.01.017.