Social inequality of urban park use during the COVID-19 pandemic

Although many studies have examined social inequalities related to urban parks, there is limited knowledge about the social inequalities of urban park use during crises. By integrating a large amount of mobile phone data and e-commerce user data, this study tracked 81,350 anonymized individuals’ urban park use behavior in Shenzhen, China, from 2019 to 2021, covering a period before and after the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Results reveal that while most of the parks saw a reduction of over 50% in the number of visitors, some parks, especially relatively small and remote parks, had more visitors after the pandemic began than before. In addition, COVID-19 has caused residents’ urban parks use time to decrease and such impacts are more severe in vulnerable groups (e.g., females, the elderly, juveniles, and low-income groups). Moreover, there are significant inequalities in urban park use between rich and poor communities, and COVID-19 has slightly exacerbated these inequalities. The study highlighted that integrating mobile phone data with e-commerce data is an effective way to unveil the complex social inequalities behind human behavior. Findings could help to improve social equality in urban park use as well as providing insights for evidence-informed decision-making in post-pandemic recovery and future crises.