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Top1. Introduction
In the year 1990, less than 40% of the global population lived in cities, but as of 2010, more than one-half of all people were living in an urban area. By the year 2030, 6 out of every 10 people will live in a city, and by 2050 this proportion will increase to 7 out of 10 people (UN HABITAT, 2014). As a result of urbanization and densification, the consumption of land by new residential developments can lead to a loss of green spaces (Kabisch et al., 2015).
Urbanization has brought the convenience of city life to many people but has also subjected them to a harsher environment. Urban environmental problems such as air pollution, noise, and urban ‘heat island’ effect pose serious risks to the health of urban residents (Douglas, 2012). With the increased concern on climate changes, urban greening has gained new importance by serving as a low-cost approach for cities to mitigate and adapt to these changes (Gill, S. E., et al., 2007).
There has been growing interest in urban green space research due to evidence that nature positively impacts human wellbeing (Frumkin, 2013, Taylor & Hochuli, 2015). Extensive studies have shown that urban green spaces can generate multiple environmental benefits, including cleaning the air, lowering noise levels, reducing urban heat island intensity, and improving storm water runoff quality (McPherson and Simpson, 2002). Urban green spaces can also provide significant psychological and socio-economic benefits to their residents such as relieving stress and increasing property value (Fuller et al., 2007).
Urban green spaces are vegetated public and residential (private) spaces in cities that are typically categorized by land use and land cover (Kendal et al., 2016). Most research attention has been paid to sizable urban green spaces such as urban parks and urban forests (Jauregui, 1990/1991; Chang et al., 2007; Chen and Wong, 2006), not much work focuses on the micro-scale greening and residential gardens.
Residential gardens are recognized as an important component of urban green space (Loram et al., 2007), but their specific contribution has rarely been assessed. Urbanization naturally tends to decrease the extent of land that is dedicated to gardens (Mathieu, R., Freeman, C., Aryal, J., 2007 & Smith, C., 2010). Within this context, residential gardens play a major role in green infrastructure (Loram, A., Tratalos, J., Warren, P.H., & Gaston, K.J., 2007) though little attention is given to their value and importance.
In low-density cities with extensive suburban areas, private gardens represent a large proportion of the overall urban green infrastructure network (Cameron et al., 2012; Ghosh & Head, 2008; Loram et al., 2007). Private residential land in Sydney provides 43% of foliage cover and 77% of Australian capital city residences have one or more trees in their private gardens (Kirkpatrick et al., 2011; Lin et al., 2015). More than 50% of total greenspace in Dunedin, New Zealand comes from private gardens (Mathieu, Freeman, & Aryal, 2007). Lin et al. (2015) suggest that residential areas present the largest opportunity for increasing tree cover in cities.
A large number of studies, especially in Western countries, have looked at how residential green spaces are used and function. However, scientific evidence for residential garden in Sri Lanka is hard to find there are no any studies carried out to understand the residential garden practices in urban cities in Sri Lanka. However residential garden in the highly populated Wet zone have suffered a considerable degradation in the past two decades due to fragmentation and urbanization in Sri Lanka (Pushpakumara, et al, 2010).
Socioeconomic variables (e.g. population, housing density, education, and home ownership) were apparently better predictors of the extent and type of vegetation cover in private garden than biophysical variables (e.g. rainfall, soil fertility, and solar radiation, etc.) (Luck et al., 2009). A range of factors influences the presence and size of the residential gardens in an urban area. Therefore, this paper sought to investigate the impact of socio demographic factors to the size of residential green spaces in a highly urbanized city in Sri Lanka.
The research objectives are:
- 1.
Identifying all socio demographic factors that influence the size and presence of a residential green space.
- 2.
Assessing the most significant factors effect on the size and presence of a residential green space.
- 3.
Developing a model to illustrate the relationship between the extent of residential green space and socio demographic factors in an urban settlement.