Envisioning carbon-smart and just urban green infrastructure

Abstract

To address the inter-connected climate and biodiversity crises, it is crucial to understand how multifunctional urban green infrastructure (UGI) is perceived to contribute to carbon neutrality, biodiversity, human well-being, and justice outcomes in cities. We explore how urban residents, including youth, associate carbon-related meanings with multifunctional UGI and how these meanings relate to co-benefits to biodiversity, well-being, and broader sustainability outcomes. Our findings are based on a survey distributed among urban residents of Helsinki, Finland (n = 487) and reveal how carbon-related meanings of UGI manifest at different levels of abstraction, agency, and scale, and incorporate community values and concerns attributed to the planning, features, functions, and transformational dimensions of UGI. Core carbon-related meanings of UGI emphasize either actions towards sustainability, carbon neutrality, biodiversity, or unfamiliarity towards such meanings. Perceived justice concerns and the socio-demographic contexts of the respondents covaried with carbon-related meanings associated with UGI. The results illustrate community perceptions of how it is not only possible, but rather expected, that multifunctional UGI is harnessed to tackle climate change, human well-being, and biodiversity loss in cities. Challenges for implementing the carbon-related benefits of UGI include navigating the different expectations placed on UGI and including residents with diverse socio-economic backgrounds during the process. Our findings contribute to a holistic understanding of how multifunctional UGI can help bridge policy agendas related to carbon neutrality, biodiversity protection, and human well-being that cities can implement when aiming for sustainable, just, and socially acceptable transitions towards a good Anthropocene.

Keywords

Carbon literacy; Carbon narratives; Environmental justice; Nature-based solutions; Sustainability transitions; Urban green infrastructure

Published in

Urban Forestry and Urban Greening
2022, Volume: 75, article number: 127682
Publisher: ELSEVIER GMBH

SLU Authors

• Raymond, Christopher

  • Department of Landscape Architecture, Planning and Management, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    
  • University of Helsinki

Sustainable Development Goals

SDG11 Sustainable cities and communities
SDG13 Climate action


UKÄ Subject classification

Landscape Architecture


Publication identifier

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ufug.2022.127682

Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/120398