Elsevier

Urban Forestry & Urban Greening

Volume 38, February 2019, Pages 165-176
Urban Forestry & Urban Greening

It’s ok to be wilder: Preference for natural growth in urban green spaces in a tropical city

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ufug.2018.12.005Get rights and content

Highlights

  • Perceptions and accepted levels of wildness in tropical urban greenery are tested.

  • Respondents, in principle, are not against moderately wilder urban greenery.

  • Utilitarian values are stronger factors of preference rather than eco-centric or aesthetic ones.

  • People in Singapore accept up to moderately wilder conditions for parks and low wildness for streetscapes.

  • More flowers, fauna, and boardwalks improve people’s preference for wild landscape.

Abstract

Urban green spaces (UGS) have the potential to aid in the restoration of ecosystem services and biodiversity in cities, but this function is often diluted because ecological processes are ignored in favour of ‘tidiness’. While the general public is not fond of unkempt greenery, a less-manicured UGS that balances the spontaneous growth of plants and maintenance regimes may be accepted. The paper describes a study exploring accepted degrees of UGS wildness, specifically areas that are currently mown lawns. In the study, a photo elicitation survey administered two sets of photos to two groups of respondents, 663 members of the general population and an additional 48 members of nature/environmental interest groups. The survey assessed perceptions of managed greenery, with three different degrees of growth of lawns in four contexts and six types of landscape elements in wilder lawns. The study found the preferred level of wildness of UGS varied depending on the context, people were generally not against moderately wilder UGS. The utilitarian aspect of landscape was a primary factor in the preference for less-manicured lawns, and aesthetics were a secondary factor. Also, general population characteristics did not consistently predict preference for any vegetation growth condition, and landscape elements differentially affected the degree of preference for wilder lawns. The article concludes by discussing the practical consequences of these findings for the inclusion of wilder UGS in design and management.

Introduction

There is a growing consensus that the complexity of urban ecosystems benefits both nature and people in cities (Pickett et al., 2016). Urban green spaces (UGS), in particular, provide a variety of ecosystem services, including biodiversity, microclimate mitigation, and storm water management (Breuste et al., 2013; Elmqvist et al., 2013), and are crucial for socio-cultural aspects, such as well-being and human health (Tzoulas et al., 2007). UGS management that supports ecological processes will enhance habitat quality (Aronson et al., 2017), and sustainable urban greening strategies contribute considerably to both ecological functions and quality of life in a compact city context (Jim, 2013). Even manicured lawns that traditionally support recreational activities, social relations, and aesthetic pleasure in cities have the potential to contribute to urban biodiversity by applying alternative heterogeneous and cost-effective principles (Ignatieva et al., 2017).

Spaces allowing vegetation to grow spontaneously in succession towards wilderness (Navarro and Pereira, 2015) are typically referred to as being ‘wilder’. There is increasing scholastic interest in this type of urban vegetation because of its ecological and biophysical benefits (Del Tredici, 2010; Robinson and Lundholm, 2012). However, the spaces created by this process are not necessarily well received by the public. Some studies on the perception of different degrees of wildness of urban greenery have found a preference for manicured grass over unkempt greenery (Poškus and Poškienė, 2015; Talbot and Kaplan, 1984). Unkempt greenery is also sometimes associated with disservices, including fear of danger (Lyytimäki et al., 2008), risk of crime (Skår, 2010), or discomfort (Bixler and Floyd, 1997).

In more recent studies, scholars highlight the socio-ecological significance of a wild urban ecosystem’s contributions to sustainable and liveable cities (McKinney et al., 2017). Threlfall and Kendal (Threlfall and Kendal, 2018) stress that wilder urban ecosystems may increase ecological aesthetics, educational opportunities, and health and human benefits through their spatial and temporal diversity, unique composition, and contribution to urban ecosystems. Public acceptance of wilder landscapes has been addressed, with Kowarik (2018) highlighting the necessity of multiple approaches to understand the supply of, demands for, and access to urban wilderness. Public acceptability is found to vary depending on the vegetation structure (Brun et al., 2018), intensity of space usage/engagement (Danford et al., 2018; Kim et al., 2018), and a minimum of maintenance and accessibility (Gandy, 2013; Hofmann et al., 2012). These studies, as well as the literature showing an increasing openness to wild urban ecosystems, however, are based in Europe and North America. Few studies consider Asian tropical cities.

In Singapore, like most other developed cities, lawns form a significant proportion of the UGS. This is a major result of the nation’s greening campaign, ‘Green and Clean’. The program started in the 1960s; creating the representative image of its landscape and aided its rapid economic growth (Barnard and Heng, 2014). The emphasis on horticultural presentation requires a high frequency of labour-intensive maintenance (Vial et al., 2011), and simultaneously lowers the biodiversity conservation potential of the landscapes (Chong et al., 2014). Critics are now asking whether highly manicured urban greenery should be the primary image of a tropical country that used to be covered by dense primary forests (Wee and Corlett, 1986). Accordingly, Singapore has begun the next step in its greening policy, focusing on enriching biodiversity in urban environments, rejuvenating urban parks, enlivening streetscapes, and restructuring industry towards a more productive and sustainable landscape (Ministry of National Development, S., 2013). The National Parks Board (NParks), a key stakeholder in Singapore, is making an effort towards labour and resource effective maintenance in landscape management (CUGE, 2015). Wilder landscape is high on the urban agenda even though it has long been viewed as less preferred than manicured landscapes (Joanne Yu Ting et al., 2014).

In order to successfully implement wilder landscapes, management practices known to improve public perception need to be implemented, including: providing edge treatments indicating ‘cues to care’ (Nassauer, 1995), utilizing spontaneous vegetation to add aesthetic value (Kühn, 2006; Oudolf and Kingsbury, 2013), and controlling the degree of wildness through selective maintenance (Hwang and Yue, in press). At this point, the response of the public to differing levels of wildness and vegetation growth is unknown and, thus, was the subject of our study. In summary, with the temporal and contextual legitimacy of wilder urban greenery in Singapore in mind, our objective was to evaluate the public’s response to wilder UGS and the factors involved.

In this study, we investigated the following four questions: 1) To what degree will the public accept wilder UGS in the context of Singapore, where UGS is mostly manicured? 2) Are people’s perceptions of wilder UGS influenced by the type of UGS? 3) What are the key factors/social variables shaping wilder UGS preference? 4) Which landscape elements are preferable in wilder UGS? To answer those questions, we simulated wilder UGS by adjusting the intensity of the maintenance regime to allow spontaneous plant growth that could increase both ecological benefits and social acceptance. We then administered a photo survey to two groups of respondents. The survey showed three degrees of wildness in four types of typical UGS, and asked for the preferences of the respondents. It also asked which attributes of wilder landscapes might determine their preferences, and asked people to choose preferable landscape elements on moderately wilder lawn context. In this paper, ‘wildness’ or ‘wilder’ refer to the process by which the greenery is grown – arising spontaneously and grown without fertilizers and watering, whilst not precluding human intervention in the form of maintenance activities.

Section snippets

Study area

Singapore is situated one degree north of the equator at the southern tip of the Malaysian peninsula (103°50ʼE, 1°20ʼN); thus, its year-round tropical climate is naturally suited for plant growth. At the same time, as it is a 100% urbanized city state, a large proportion of the landscape consists of planned greenery with homogeneous manicured lawns, sometimes with single-tier shrubs planted beside them. The lawns are intensely controlled, requiring regular grass cutting on a fortnightly basis

Responses to level of wildness and UGS types

The means of the responses of the respondents to each item for each context-condition, the associated standard deviation, and the significant differences between the L1 (no wildness), L2 (low wildness), and L3 (medium wildness) vegetative growth conditions for each context are noted in Tables 2 and 3 for the general population and the nature group respectively.

In general, the HDB landscape and park were significantly preferred by the general population group over the streetscape and roof

Discussion

Urban wilderness is an issue that is increasingly gaining attention internationally (Kowarik, 2018; Threlfall and Kendal, 2018). While most studies on preference for wilder urban environments are mostly from cities in temperate regions, this is the first study that systemically analyses preference for wilder growth in UGS within a tropical city. This section discusses the survey’s findings on the accepted degree of wilder urban landscape, key attributes of acceptance, preferred landscape

Conclusion

Cities have traditionally planned urban greenery with intensive maintenance in mind, based on a preconception that the public prefers a manicured and neat landscape over wilder and messier vegetation. However, Singaporeans have grown more conscious of the value of wild and natural environments (O’Dempsey, 2014), causing some to debate whether they truly prefer ‘manicured’ lawns over ‘untamed wilderness’ (Kong and Yeoh, 1996). And in fact, this study shows Singaporeans positively perceive and

Acknowledgements

This work was made possible by funding from NUS-MOE (Ministry of Education) Tier1 Research Fund, Singapore under Grant Number R-295- 000-112- 112 (Singapore). The authors wish to thank the Centre for Urban Greenery and Ecology (CUGE) at the National Parks Board Singapore for supporting the survey. A special thanks to Joan Iverson Nassauer and Dr. Tan Puay Yokfor thoughtful comments and advice on the initial paper.

References (89)

  • C. Jim et al.

    Socioeconomic effect on perception of urban green spaces in Guangzhou, China

    Cities

    (2013)
  • A. Jorgensen et al.

    Woodland spaces and edges: their impact on perception of safety and preference

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2002)
  • E. Karjalainen et al.

    Visualization in forest landscape preference research: a Finnish perspective

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2002)
  • I. Kowarik

    Urban wilderness: supply, demand, and access

    Urban For. Urban Green.

    (2018)
  • J.R. Miller

    Biodiversity conservation and the extinction of experience

    Trends Ecol. Evol.

    (2005)
  • A. Nagase et al.

    Drought tolerance in different vegetation types for extensive green roofs: effects of watering and diversity

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2010)
  • Å. Ode et al.

    Indicators of perceived naturalness as drivers of landscape preference

    J. Environ. Manage.

    (2009)
  • H. Özgüner et al.

    Public attitudes towards naturalistic versus designed landscapes in the city of Sheffield (UK)

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2006)
  • H. Özgüner et al.

    Attitudes of landscape professionals towards naturalistic versus formal urban landscapes in the UK

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2007)
  • K.K. Peschardt et al.

    Use of small public urban green spaces (SPUGS)

    Urban For. Urban Green.

    (2012)
  • B. Rohrmann et al.

    Subjective responses to computer simulations of urban environments

    J. Environ. Psychol.

    (2002)
  • S. Schetke et al.

    What determines the use of urban green spaces in highly urbanized areas?–examples from two fast growing Asian cities

    Urban For. Urban Green.

    (2016)
  • J. Schipperijn et al.

    Influences on the use of urban green space–a case study in Odense, Denmark

    Urban For. Urban Green.

    (2010)
  • M. Skår

    Forest dear and forest fear: Dwellers’ relationships to their neighbourhood forest

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2010)
  • R.C. Smardon

    Perception and aesthetics of the urban environment: review of the role of vegetation

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (1988)
  • C. Swanwick

    Society’s attitudes to and preferences for land and landscape

    Land Use Policy

    (2009)
  • C.W. Thompson

    Urban open space in the 21st century

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2002)
  • C.G. Threlfall et al.

    The distinct ecological and social roles that wild spaces play in urban ecosystems

    Urban For. Urban Green.

    (2018)
  • A. Todorova et al.

    Preferences for and attitudes towards street flowers and trees in Sapporo, Japan

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2004)
  • K. Tzoulas et al.

    Promoting ecosystem and human health in urban areas using Green infrastructure: a literature review

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (2007)
  • A. Voigt et al.

    Does diversity matter? The experience of urban nature’s diversity: case study and cultural concept

    Ecosyst. Serv.

    (2015)
  • É. Vouligny et al.

    An assessment of ordinary landscapes by an expert and by its residents: landscape values in areas of intensive agricultural use

    Land Use Policy

    (2009)
  • F. Weber et al.

    A walk on the wild side: perceptions of roadside vegetation beyond trees

    Urban For. Urban Green.

    (2014)
  • S. Yilmaz et al.

    Determination of user profile at city parks: a sample from Turkey

    Build. Environ.

    (2007)
  • K. Yu

    Cultural variations in landscape preference: comparisons among Chinese sub-groups and Western design experts

    Landscape Urban Plann.

    (1995)
  • M.F. Aronson et al.

    Biodiversity in the city: key challenges for urban green space management

    Front. Ecol. Environ.

    (2017)
  • T. Auger

    Living in a garden: The greening of Singapore

    (2013)
  • T.P. Barnard et al.

    A City in a Garden

  • R.D. Bixler et al.

    Nature is scary, disgusting, and uncomfortable

    Environ. Behav.

    (1997)
  • M. Bonnes et al.

    The ambivalence of attitudes toward Urban Green areas: between proenvironmental worldviews and daily residential experience

    Environ. Behav.

    (2011)
  • J. Breuste et al.

    Urban ecology

    (2013)
  • P. Clergeau et al.

    Human Perception and Appreciation of Birds: a Motivation for Wildlife Conservation in Urban Environments of France Avian Ecology and Conservation in an Urbanizing World

    (2001)
  • CUGE

    Sustinable Landscape Center for Urban Greenery & Ecology

    (2015)
  • P. Del Tredici

    Wild Urban Plants of the Northeast : A Field Guide

    (2010)
  • Cited by (0)

    View full text