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Some cities have lots of parks, some don’t have much. Is there a correct amount? How do planners plan for park space?
Check out my Nebula Original video on Central Park:
Vox video on Pickleball: https://youtu.be/5bp-0aaXYsA
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Resources on this topic:
https://www.audubon.org/news/whiter-neighborhoods-get-more-park-space-new-report-shows
Parks make great places, but not enough Americans can reach them
https://www.parksforcalifornia.org/parkaccess/?overlays1=parks%2Cnoparkaccess&overlays2=parks%2Cparksper1000
https://www.slocity.org/home/showpublisheddocument/29503/637690273249070000
Produced by Dave Amos and the fine folks at Nebula Studios.
Written by Dave Amos and Hannah Woolsey
Select images and video from Getty Images.
Black Lives Matter.
42 Comments
Great video. Another thing that is difficult to do, but can be really beneficial, is connecting as much of the parks/green space as possible. The Chicago boulevard system is a decent example, but when parks are connected though walking/biking trails they can be really special.
I am a rural guy so in my opinion access to open space/parks/beaches/hiking trails is vital to a decent quality of life. So no, a city can never have enough parks.
Pauses
Goes to Nebula. 😅
A great video overall which encompasses a surprising variety of information for its length.
However, I dispute the formula used for the table which shows Taipei at the bottom (even colored in red on the video). It is one of the few world cities that has a national park that overlaps its city limits, with enormous wetlands and vast dormant and extinct volcanoes and hot spring. It seems the foundation counted only municipal (and not national) park land within the city boundary.
Your point about heat islands is well taken. Nevertheless, the video presents a rather suburban car-centric view of measuring access to the park by distance. While I agree way too many people in Taipei live in heat islands, the impressive metro system enables every resident of reaching a park within 15 minutes of home. The natural landscape is so impressive that National Geographic produced a video about a strenuous nature hike around the city that takes several days to complete.
Edinburgh (Scotland) resident here, formerly a denizen of the suburban wastelands of the Greater Toronto Area. Edinburgh has about 49% of its space dedicated to parks: family play areas, meadows, forested paths, undeveloped hills, etc, many of which are easily accessible from rich and poor neighbourhoods alike.
As someone who escaped suburbia, I can't emphasise enough how completely this transforms quality of life. Everything from fresh air and meeting other locals to exercise and just places to slow down and be mindful. Plus, Scotland has the 'right to roam', basically meaning so long as you leave no trace and don't cause damage, you can go (more or less) wherever you like – even off paths! It's incredible, but had to be fought hard for – now that it's a thing, I can't imagine living anywhere that doesn't have a) significant green spaces, and b) universal access rights. Going to visit family back in Canada now feels like being put in car prison.
If you feature Edinburgh in this series, I'm a long-time local and historian who would love to show you why this city is amazing!
My city has basically 0 parks 🥲
I live in Philadelphia. We have great parks, but not enough of them. Especially in south Philly where I live.
Istanbul, not Constantinople.
Great video it made me look at the percentage of parks in My city (Halifax N.S) which is 73% much higher then I would’ve have expected
Pittsburgh has some pretty decent parks. Frick and Schenley Parks are in the middle of the city but make you feel like you’re out in the woods when you’re on the trails. Allegheny Cemetery doubles as a really nice large park with shaded paths to walk through on hot summer days.
Central Park is overrated. It looks like a gave for mother nature that is about to be buried after finally succumbing to concreteitis. In other cities parks are more integrated with the harbour, the route to work etc
As someone living in Istanbul, yes the city desperately needs more open space
It is an offense to talk about parks and not mention Mexico City which has the first public park in the American continent founded in 1592 La Alameda Central and with more than 100 parks each one different
It heavily depends how green your city streets are as well. More grass an trees in urban streets make the need for more parks less. Take for example Amsterdam
Why do you use California as an example? By the way, Michigan was the first to come up with the idea of rest areas with parks while traveling.
atatürk airport is not actually vacant. government decided to make a 3rd airport in istanbul and make it biggest in europe and also give it "gov.-friendlier" construction firms to build and use for 12 years, 342 million passengers were assured.
they build it north of istanbul, forested area despite negative environmental impact assessment (ÇED) report. it danger migrant birds and north forests in istanbul. also it is too far from city. meanwhile atatürk airport was functional with better accessibility, better air and wind conditions for planes, lesser environmental impact. but they shut down it for 3rd airport.
now they want to convert this still usable in a good condition airport to a garden against high court decision but that's a sugarcoating. airlines will use it more than 3rd airport and take cash flow away from their partisan construction firms.
For the case of Istanbul a good solution can be moving the cemeteries to outskirts and turning current cemeteries into parks as there are many including central areas and some are pretty large. But also you definitely need many more smaller green areas, which can be sort of difficult as city is very packed.
I know Boston Common. There's a pond where a giant supermutant Swan lives.
Everyone getting grabbed up by nebula it's starting to actually get annoying hearing about it no one cares why would we we wanna pay for content we can watch for free (wooah bonus videos… You upload later anyway and even if you don't it's not worth the money or the upcharge later on when you overcharge us on renewals)
I’d like to know how much publicly accessible green space Edinburgh has. Much of the inner urban green spaces are privately owned and locked off to the general public. This surely distorts the figure allowing Edinburgh to appear more green than it actually is to its citizenry.
Surprised San Francisco only has 13% of land devoted to open space. Between Golden Gate Park, the Presidio, and many small parks everywhere, it feels like San Francisco has far more parks than NYC or other cities.
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As a former Vancouver resident I know Stanley Park well. A delightful piece of nature in the city, though sometimes a little too popular for its own good. Most of the other parks in the city are green spaces with playing fields, not much in the way of trees and critters.
I have enough parks.
i live in regina saskatchewan, and i have access to a major bike path that has a decent amount of park space along it, two elementary school playgrounds, and a handful of lil playgrounds, all within about a 10 min walk, add on another like two or three school playgrounds, within a 15 min walk, we also have a large main city park that is connected to the bike path that goes by my house that has a large park that goes around a man made lake in the middle of the city, quite literally a few km from downtown where your able to kayak and whatnot too! i love the parks lol
People don't realize how much parks matter to good urbanism. Also, thanks for mentioning disc golf, we love our disc golf courses in city parks!
San Francisco County is continuous with SF city limits.
Metro Manila has left.
My local park is 300 acres.
EDIT: I live in a town of 26,000, so take that in..
Glasgow (Scotland) has over 90 parks and green space at the moment and is planning to make the city centre more green and pedestrian friendly.
Toronto may only have 13% but honestly it doesn't feel short of parks.
The easiest method for some cities now would be to put up trees in the streets.
Oslo != Ahslow
I live near downtown Columbus OH, and while it’s certainly not an urbanist paradise things are improving. One of the big things has to be the parks, including greenways along the rivers downtown that until just over a decade ago was an expressway
I'd love for you to look at my city, Christchurch New Zealand. After the city was destroyed by an earthquake, several suburbs have become open space yet to be developed into a park park area
Pretty simple solution, transform exclusive golf courses for the wealthy into public spaces
thank God for living in a farm 😌✅️
There's something about city greenery that pisses me off. I just want to enjoy the urban landscape without parks getting in the way. I am definitely in the minority in this, though.
Manchester desperately needs parks – as someone who has lived much of my time in London and lived elsewhere, I am absolutely disgusted with the lack of parks in central Manchester. Its one of the reasons I would not live there.
Along with the sad Mancunian obsession with being like London. Don't be like London, London is a great city by many marks but it's awful to live in and people are rude.
68% sounds bad too. Imagine if all that land was dedicated to preserving virgin forests.
London may not have the highest proportion of open space but a great deal of it is located centrally, in Green Park, Hyde Park, Kensington Gardens, Regent's Park, and St James's Park. These are all former royal hunting grounds and each has their own personality which adds a richness to the urban environment. BTW – you can still find cows grazing on the common lands in central Cambridge (UK).
The Oslo stat is surely slanted heavily by Nordmarka.