Urban edge trees: Urban form and meteorology drive elemental carbon deposition to canopies and soils

Article asserts that urban tree canopies are a significant sink for atmospheric elemental carbon (EC)--and air pollutant that is a powerful climate-forcing agent and threat to human health. The authors' findings indicate that complex configurations of roads, buildings, and vegetation produce “urban edge trees” that contribute to heterogeneous EC deposition patterns across urban systems, with implications for greenspace planning

Revealing Promising Pathways for Increasing Urban Ecosystem Services: An Approach Combining Stakeholder Priorities with Ecosystem Service Quantification

Urban development diminishes the delivery of ecosystem services (ES), defined as benefits from ecological processes and functions critical to human health and well-being. Land-use planners and environmental managers are increasingly familiar with the concept of ES; however, methods for incorporating ES into urban planning are underdeveloped. While previous reports have identified the combination of ES quantification and stakeholder engagement as necessary for increasing the delivery of ES, methods of implementation remain unexplored. To address this disparity, this study combines ES quantification with perspectives from multiple stakeholders to identify specific land cover conversion scenarios that increase the delivery of ES in the Friendly Area Neighborhood of Eugene, Oregon and compares each conversion scenario using an informed weighting system. The result is a method, with potential for use by researchers and public officials, to quantify the delivery of ES, identify stakeholders’ ES priorities, and assess the benefits associated with green infrastructure development.2020-01-1

A Guide to Public Green Space Planning for Urban Ecosystem Services

Street trees, native plantings, bioswales, and other forms of green infrastructure alleviate urban air and water pollution, diminish flooding vulnerability, support pollinators, and provide other benefits critical to human well-being. Urban planners increasingly value such urban ecosystem services (ES), and effective methods for deciding among alternative planting regimes using urban ES criteria are under active development. In this effort, integrating stakeholder values and concerns with quantitative urban ES assessments is a central challenge; although it is widely recommended, specific approaches have yet to be explored. Here, we develop, apply, and evaluate such a method in the Friendly Area Neighborhood of Eugene, Oregon by investigating the potential for increased urban ES through the conversion of public lawn to alternative planting regimes that align with expressed stakeholder priorities. We first estimated current urban ES from green space mapping and published supply rates, finding lawn cover and associated ES to be dominant. Resident and expert priorities were then revealed through surveys and Delphi analyses; top priorities included air quality, stormwater quality, native plantings, and pollinator habitat, while concerns focused on cost and safety. Unexpectedly, most residents expressed a willingness to support urban ES improvements financially. This evidence then informed the development of planting regime alternatives among which we compared achievable future urban ES delivery, revealing clear differences among those that maximized stakeholder priorities, those that maximized quantitative urban ES delivery, and their integration. The resulting contribution is a straightforward method for identifying planting regimes with a high likelihood of success in delivering desired urban ES in specific local contexts