ABSTRACT
COVID-19 has heightened the dependence of urban dwellers on cultural ecosystem services provided by urban green spaces (UGS), specifically in regard to the provision of recreational opportunities, and psychological and physical health benefits arising from their use.As different types and levels of cultural ecosystem services are provided by different types of UGS, people may seek out different UGS to satisfy personal needs over various phases of COVID-19 mobility restrictions imposed by cities. We report on a study that took advantage of the different phases of COVID-19 mobility restrictions to assess the demand for and perception of different types of UGS in Singapore.The study utilised four datasets to compare demand for and visitorship patterns of UGS before the pandemic (Pre-Circuit Breaker), the duration of the strictest mobility restrictions (Circuit Breaker), and after the measures were relaxed (Post-Circuit Breaker). We used Google Search trends as a proxy for UGS demand, Google mobility data for an overview of population visitorship trends, visitor counts for granular insights on actual visitorship trends, and qualitative data on perception of parks by park visitors after restrictions eased. Parks were categorised as manicured and less manicured UGS for analysis.Search interest for UGS overall fell by more than 50% from during Circuit Breaker but the post-Circuit Breaker levels exceeded pre-Circuit Breaker, with a 70.9% increase for less manicured UGS compared to 20.8% for manicured UGS. This corroborated with Google mobility and visitor counts, which showed a steep decrease in park use followed by a rapid increase in the same periods, and with increased visitorship in the less manicured UGS. The perception study also showed that more than 50% of respondents reported visiting parks that they have never visited before, and there was a greater appreciation and use of UGS after the pandemic and preference for less manicured and more naturalistic landscapes.The pandemic has heightened the demand for cultural ecosystem services provided by UGS. Our study showed that this demand is not uniform across different types of UGS, with an increase visitorship and preference for less manicured green spaces. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog.
ABSTRACT
To curb the spread of Covid-19, Singapore, like other cities, had to impose movement restriction and social distancing measures that may affect the well-being of its residents. In this paper, we assessed the potential benefits of gardening on the mental well-being of Singapore residents, based on the concept of mental resilience. We hypothesized that gardening activities promote mental resilience. A survey was administered on 8,786 participants of a "Gardening with Edibles" programme, measuring their mental resilience status, engagement in gardening activities and socio-demographic information. The mental resilience scores of participants who engaged in weekly gardening were compared with the scores derived from another survey conducted during the pandemic on an online community comprising demographically representative respondents with an interest on Covid-19 related community care. The results showed that the mental resilience of those who gardened was statistically significantly higher than the online community. Within the gardening group, those with less than one hour of weekly gardening time had significantly lower scores in their total mental resilience, and five out of seven resilience factors, "emotional regulation", "relationship", "confidence", "positive thinking" and "spirituality", compared to those with more weekly gardening time, showing that the efficacy of the mediating effects may peak at a weekly gardening time of between one to four hours. Home gardening may be an effective way for people living in densely populated cities to interact with nature and build mental resilience during the pandemic.
ABSTRACT
Invasive species are a growing concern with increasing global connectivity. Feral pigeons (Columba livia) are widespread and invasive, thus their effective control is of keen international interest. The COVID-19 pandemic has offered an unprecedented opportunity to investigate the impact of a nation-wide Circuit Breaker (restricted human activities) in Singapore on first, the abundance of the feral pigeons and three urban commensals—the Javan myna (Acridotheres javanicus), common myna (A. tristis), and house crow (Corvus splendens) in different food source types;and second, the activity budgets of feral pigeons. A significant and progressive decline in feral pigeon abundance was observed in open food centres and feeding hotspots after the Circuit Breaker was implemented. While the house crow and common myna were less affected, the Javan myna abundance increased moderately at refuse collection centres during the Circuit Breaker and decreased significantly in green spaces after the Circuit Breaker. Changes in food abundance could also predict changes in feral pigeon abundance and its effect was greatest in feeding hotspots. A greater proportion of feral pigeons was observed foraging and moving with a smaller proportion seen resting with probable consequences on their reproductive capacity. Our study also cautions against drawing inferences on biological responses due to similar social restrictions without careful consideration of other ecological factors, like average flock size and time of the day, which also affected the proportion of pigeons foraging on natural versus anthropogenic food. In summary, our results advocate a food limitation approach to control the feral pigeon populations.