Recreation and Amenity Values of Urban Stream Corridors: Implications for Green Infrastructure

C. Scott Shafer, David Scott, John Baker and Kirk Winemiller

Journal of Urban Design, 2013, vol. 18, issue 4, 478-493

Abstract: 'Green infrastructure' is a term used to describe systems of parks, greenways, open spaces and other natural landscape elements that provide community benefits. Although we have some understanding of how people use parks and developed greenways, little has been documented about use of the undesignated public and private spaces along green infrastructure features such as stream corridors. The purpose of this research was to examine characteristics that may influence people's use of undesignated open spaces along the stream corridors that form the skeleton of many green infrastructure systems. Data were obtained from a Recreational Use Attainability Analysis (RUAA), an evaluation performed for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. The RUAA was conducted for 85 survey sites along 243 km (151 miles) of streams in Houston's Buffalo Bayou watershed. Results indicate that the proximity of stream corridors to local residents, the level of pedestrian access available and tree cover were the best predictors of recreational use while the presence of water, fish or other wildlife were not significant predictors. Observations also indicated that urban and suburban stream corridors afford a variety of recreational and aesthetic values to residents. Implications for policy, planning and design of green infrastructure are discussed.

Date: 2013
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/13574809.2013.800450 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:cjudxx:v:18:y:2013:i:4:p:478-493

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/cjud20

DOI: 10.1080/13574809.2013.800450

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Urban Design is currently edited by Professor Taner Oc, Professor Michael Southworth, Professor Matthew Carmona and Dr Elisabete Cidre

More articles in Journal of Urban Design from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().