IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v20y2023i5p4050-d1079150.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Urban Tree Canopy and Environmental Justice: Examining the Distributional Equity of Urban Tree Canopy in Guangzhou, China

Author

Listed:
  • Yutian Zhuang

    (School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Guangdong University of Technology, Guangzhou 510090, China)

  • Dixiang Xie

    (School of Architecture and Urban Planning, Guangdong University of Technology, Guangzhou 510090, China)

  • Xijun Yu

    (South China Institute for Environmental Science, Ministry of Ecology and Environment, Guangzhou 510655, China)

Abstract

Rapid urbanization has led to a series of environmental problems that are harmful to the physical and mental health of residents. Not only can increasing urban tree canopy (UTC) improve sustainable city development, but it can also effectively promote the quality of life for residents; however, the uneven spatial distribution of UTC can also bring about social justice problems. Currently, there are few studies related to the justice of UTC distribution in China. Based on this, the paper adopts object-oriented image classification technology to interpret and extract UTC data from satellite images, and it uses house price to explore the justice of the spatial distribution of UTC in the main urban area of Guangzhou from the perspective of environmental justice by ANOVA, Pearson correlation coefficient, and bivariate local spatial autocorrelation. The results show that: (1) There is a significant positive correlation between UTC and house price in the main urban area of Guangzhou, and there are regional differences in the distribution of UTC, with the UTC in the “very high” house price group being significantly higher than that in other groups. (2) The spatial clustering of UTC and house price in the main urban area of Guangzhou is found to be “low-low” and “high-high”; thus, it can be concluded that the spatial distribution of UTC in the main urban area of Guangzhou is uneven. This is an environmental injustice, as the areas with low UTC are spatially clustered in old residential areas, while the areas with high UTC are spatially clustered in commercial housing estates with high house prices. The study shows that urban tree planting should not only focus on quantitative improvement but also on equitable spatial layouts to promote social equity and justice thereby improving the urban ecological environment and promoting healthy urban development.

Suggested Citation

  • Yutian Zhuang & Dixiang Xie & Xijun Yu, 2023. "Urban Tree Canopy and Environmental Justice: Examining the Distributional Equity of Urban Tree Canopy in Guangzhou, China," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(5), pages 1-14, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:5:p:4050-:d:1079150
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/5/4050/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/20/5/4050/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Siqi Yu & Xigang Zhu & Qian He, 2020. "An Assessment of Urban Park Access Using House-Level Data in Urban China: Through the Lens of Social Equity," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(7), pages 1-19, March.
    2. Atefeh Tamaskani Esfehankalateh & Jack Ngarambe & Geun Young Yun, 2021. "Influence of Tree Canopy Coverage and Leaf Area Density on Urban Heat Island Mitigation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(13), pages 1-14, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Zihe Wang & Gege Yan & Siyuan Wang, 2022. "Fairness Evaluation of Landscape Justice in Urban Park Green Space: A Case Study of the Daxing Part of Yizhuang New Town, Beijing," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(1), pages 1-18, December.
    2. Yang Yang & Ruizhen He & Guohang Tian & Zhen Shi & Xinyu Wang & Albert Fekete, 2022. "Equity Study on Urban Park Accessibility Based on Improved 2SFCA Method in Zhengzhou, China," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-17, November.
    3. Qinyu Cui & Yiting Huang & Guang Yang & Yu Chen, 2022. "Measuring Green Exposure Levels in Communities of Different Economic Levels at Different Completion Periods: Through the Lens of Social Equity," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-26, August.
    4. Danying Zhang & Haijian Liu & Zhifeng Yu, 2023. "Analysis on the Rationality of Urban Green Space Distribution in Hangzhou City Based on GF-1 Data," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(15), pages 1-17, August.
    5. Yi-Ya Hsu & Zih-Hong Lin & Chong-En Li, 2023. "Realising the Sustainable Development Goal 11.7 in the post-pandemic era – A case study of Taiwan," Environment and Planning B, , vol. 50(1), pages 162-181, January.
    6. Mingyuan Chang & Longyang Huang & Tianlin Zhai & Jiawei Zhu & Yuanbo Ma & Ling Li & Chenchen Zhao, 2023. "A Challenge of Sustainable Urbanization: Mapping the Equity of Urban Public Facilities in Multiple Dimensions in Zhengzhou, China," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(8), pages 1-22, August.
    7. Ying Liu & Huan Wang & Cheng Sun & Huifang Wu, 2022. "Equity Measurement of Public Sports Space in Central Urban Areas Based on Residential Scale Data," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(5), pages 1-14, March.
    8. Jiangjun Wan & Yutong Zhao & Kaili Zhang & Chunchi Ma & Haiying Sun & Ziming Wang & Hongyu Wu & Mingjie Li & Lingqing Zhang & Xiaohong Tang & Ying Cao & Li Tang & Jinxiu Yang, 2022. "Healthy Community-Life Circle Planning Combining Objective Measurement and Subjective Evaluation: Theoretical and Empirical Research," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(9), pages 1-25, April.
    9. Patricio Pacheco & Eduardo Mera & Voltaire Fuentes, 2023. "Intensive Urbanization, Urban Meteorology and Air Pollutants: Effects on the Temperature of a City in a Basin Geography," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 20(5), pages 1-20, February.
    10. Yilun Cao & Yuhan Guo & Mingjuan Zhang, 2022. "Research on the Equity of Urban Green Park Space Layout Based on Ga2SFCA Optimization Method—Taking the Core Area of Beijing as an Example," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(8), pages 1-20, August.
    11. Zamponi, Virginia & O’Brien, Kevin & Jensen, Erik & Feldhaus, Brandon & Moore, Russell & Lynch, Christopher J. & Gore, Ross, 2023. "Understanding and assessing demographic (in)equity resulting from extreme heat and direct sunlight exposure due to lack of tree canopies in Norfolk, VA using agent-based modeling," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 483(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:20:y:2023:i:5:p:4050-:d:1079150. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.