The Role of Greenery in Stress Reduction among City Residents during the COVID-19 Pandemic.

Cities, as places of social interactions and human relationships, face new challenges, problems, and threats, which are sources of stress for residents. An additional cause of stress in recent years has been the COVID-19 pandemic; it was urban dwellers who were most exposed to the virus and most affected by it. Chronic stress has led to the serious erosion of physical health and psychophysical well-being among urban dwellers, and so there is a need to seek new solutions in terms of building the resilience of cities and their residents to stress. This study aims to verify the hypothesis that greenery reduced the level of stress among urban dwellers during the pandemic. The verification of this hypothesis was achieved based on a literature analysis and the results of geo-questionnaire studies conducted involving 651 residents of Poznan-among the largest of Polish cities, where the share of green areas in the spatial structure is more than 30%. According to the analysis, the interviewees experienced above-average stress levels that went up during the pandemic, and the source was not so much the virus but the restrictions imposed. Green areas and outdoor activities helped in reducing this stress (being surrounded by and looking at greenery, garden work, or plant cultivation). Residents perceive a post-pandemic city as one that is more green, in which priority is given to unmanaged green areas. It has also been pointed out that a response to the reported need for urban re-construction towards stress resilience may be a biophilic city.

Cities in the epidemic, the epidemic in cities: Reconstruction of COVID-19 development in Polish cities.

The Covid-19 pandemic, with its epicentres in cities, came as the most severe social, economic and financial shock of the 21st century. The reconstruction of the pandemic spread in cities, the determination of factors conducive to and preventing from SARS-CoV-2 virus infections as well as searching for the ways to combat it and its effects have become the subject of many studies and analyses. The results presented in this article are part of this research. The study covered 20 large Polish cities with different functions, in the set of which: (1) the course of the infection process (by means of a rarely used trajectory method) was determined as well as its temporal variation (variance), (2) cities were classified in terms of the similarity of the epidemic process (correlation analysis), and (3) the factors conducive to infections presented in the literature (using a multivariate regression method) were verified. In this case the investigation was also carried out on the set of 66 large cities. Generally, the relative number of infections (per 10,000 inhabitants), i.e. the intensity of infections, was used as the basis for the analysis. The research has shown that the size, function and location within the country have no influence on the course and intensity of the epidemic in particular cities. Unfortunately, it was not possible to identify factors that could be responsible for infections, or at least that could determine the risk of infections (no confirmed impact on infections of population density, the level of poverty, the proportion of a post-working age population or the level of people's health). Thus, the obtained results testify to the individual nature of the spread of the epidemic in each city and to the possible influence of other explanatory features on the infection level than those considered in this investigation, or to the level of infections as the effect of the synergetic interaction of more than just socio-economic features. The solution to this issue remains open, as it seems, not only in the case of Polish cities.

Dynamics of Open Green Areas in Polish and Romanian Cities during 2006–2018: Insights for Spatial Planners

Studying green urban infrastructure is important because of its ecosystem services, contributing to the welfare and comfort of citizens, mitigation of climate changes, and sustainability goals. Urban planning can increase or diminish the performance of ecosystem services. Despite numerous studies on the green infrastructure–services–planning nexus, there are very few concrete planning recommendations. This study aims to provide such recommendations for a broader audience by analyzing the dynamic of open green areas in Polish and Romanian cities, connected with its drivers. A novel approach including mathematical modeling and geostatistical analyses was applied to Urban Atlas and statistical yearbooks data. The results indicated that open green areas were lost and fragmented in all Romanian and Polish cities during 2006–2018. The drivers included urban built-up areas, population and density, the number of building permits, number of new dwellings completed, number of employees, and total length of roads. The study also revealed a tremendous lack of consistent datasets across the countries using the same statistical indicators. Based on the findings, planners should aim to preserve and develop urban greenery and maintain its continuity. City managers should use more research and decision-making policy developers to develop targeted policies and scientists should develop planning manuals.