Mapping cultural ecosystem services of the urban riverscapes: the case of the Vistula River in Warsaw, Poland

Urban green and blue spaces play a key role in strengthening human-nature bonds as they offer a variety of opportunities to directly contact nature. They are robust providers of cultural ecosystem services (CES), non-material benefits arising from the interaction between people and nature. Recreation in green and blue spaces beneficially contributes to the well-being of urban dwellers in multiple ways, and the character of these contributions depends both on spaces’ features and visitors’ characteristics. The flow of CES related to the recreational use of urban parks and forests have been widely studied; however, much less attention has been paid to urban riverscapes. This study aimed to fill this gap by assessing benefits associated with the recreational use of urban rivers, and determining drivers that affect these experiences. Using the case of Vistula River in Warsaw, Poland, a citywide PPGIS survey was conducted to map several types of recreation-related benefits. Binomial logistic regression models were built to explain positive contributions to well-being as a function of attributes of visitors, spatiotemporal preferences of visits, and preferred activities. Survey participants highly assessed urban riverscape benefits, with the general tendency of highest scores to be clustered in the city core. Benefits vary in terms of drivers they are affected, with three main insights: (1) intellectual and emotional attachment to the riverscape is built through the long-term process of repetitive visits; (2) the devotion to nature is based on direct experiences, and strongly associated with sports; (3) on-water recreation underpins both emotional attachment to the river and social interactions. The results bring spatially explicit information on people’s attitudes towards the urban river, and underscore the complexity of links between people and the riverscape. The knowledge on spatiotemporal patterns and drivers affecting riverscape-related benefits may support the sustainable planning and management of nature-based recreation in cities.