Walking to Urban Parks: Public Quality and Access

Abstract

Urban parks are green areas known for their multifunctional nature, including playgrounds, sport and leisure zones, vegetation, walkways, and resting areas. Given their size and composition, they offer citizens physical and social benefits, in addition to ecological and environmental benefits to the city itself. Living close to one of these areas is fundamental to improve the quality of living. This study measures the walking access of residents with different demographic profiles to 13 urban parks ranked based on their quality in the city of Concepción, Chile. The findings show that adults and children have easy access to quality parks, while senior citizens, affected by reduced mobility and downtown residence, show the worst results regardless of the existing parks’ quality.