RESEARCH
Our team is currently working on the following interdisciplinary research themes and projects:
Equitable Urban Forest Governance, Planning and Co-Production
THEME
An Exploration of Equitable Urban Forest Governance
Researcher: Kaitlyn Pike
Project Description: This project aims to understand how urban greening can proceed in an equitable way that meets the needs of affected communities. It creates a framework for equitable urban forest governance and uses this framework to assess (in)equitable governance in 4 North American cities. It then examines links between equitable governance and equitable outcomes, via analyses of distributional green equity and community perceptions of urban forests.
Project Funding: Kaitlyn's work is supported by a UBC 4-year Fellowship (2020-2024) and a scholarship from the NSERC CREATE UFor program (2021-2024, UQO).
Principal Investigator: Lorien Nesbitt
Radical Co-Production for Just Urban Greening
Researcher: Daniel Sax
Project Description: Drawing on the concepts and practices of futurity, radical planning, and action research, this project seeks to understand how to conceptualize and action co-productive urban greening. It brings together theory and action to articulate theoretical approaches to holistic, environmentally just urban greening and creates a practical toolkit to support communities in equitable urban greening.
Project Funding: Daniel's work is supported by a UBC 4-year Fellowship (2021-2025)
Partner: Ciudad Emergente
Principal Investigator: Lorien Nesbitt
Green Spaces for Diversity: A Perspective on Individual Behaviour, Values, and Well-being
Researcher: Johanna Bock
Project Description: This project aims to understand the pathways linking contact with urban nature and psychological well-being, behaviours that facilitate urban nature contact, and the values that influence human-nature relationships and associated health outcomes. Focusing on diverse human populations and diverse types of urban nature (including virtual nature), this research creates a framework with which to understand the psychological benefits of urban nature contact, the daily behaviours that bring us into contact with urban nature in its many forms, and the values that underpin nature-oriented behaviours and the benefits we derive from nature. This research can inform the planning and management of urban natural spaces as well as policies to enhance accessible contact with nature.
Project Funding: Johanna's work is supported by a scholarship from the NSERC CREATE UFor Program (2021-2024, UQO) and by Mitacs Accelerate with Rogers Canada Inc.
Partner: Rogers Canada Inc.
Principal Investigator: Lorien Nesbitt
Urban Forests for Climate Resilience
THEME
Greening for Cooler Cities
Researchers: Zhaohua (Cindy) Cheng
Project Description: This project aims to understand how urban forests can improve climate change planning and action, particularly by helping to cool neighbourhoods as cities densify and extreme temperatures become more common. This research examines how urban forestry, urban planning, and climate change adaptation policies align or compete, both in the policy arena and in their implementation. It also analyzes a series of what-if scenarios to understand how tree species selection and urban greening strategies can help cool neigbourhoods as they densify.
Project Funding: Cindy's work is supported by funding from the SSHRC Doctoral Canada Graduate Scholarship (2020-2022) and by a SSHRC Insight Grant (PI: Cynthia Girling, UBC SALA).
Principal Investigators: Lorien Nesbitt, Stephen Sheppard
Coping with Heat: Community Perceptions and Experiences of Urban Forests in Metro Vancouver, Canada
Researcher: Kit Wong-Stevens
Project Description: This project aims to understand the how vulnerable urban residents in Metro Vancouver experience extreme heat and how they use urban forests to cope with these experiences. It also examines if and how urban residents' climate change adaptation and urban forestry needs are integrated into policy documents.
Project Funding: Kit's work is supported by a scholarship from the NSERC CREATE Ufor program (2021-2022, UQO).
Principal Investigator: Lorien Nesbitt
Building Greener and Resilient Cities: A Social-ecological Approach
Researcher: Tahia Devisscher
Project Description: This project studies the role of urban forests to increase social-ecological resilience in and around cities. The first phase of the project assesses the way in which urban forests and the services they provide are affected by different landscape configurations and climate risks. The second phase evaluates the way in which citizens perceive, value and interact with different urban forests along an urban-rural gradient. Synergies and tradeoffs between ecosystem services are identified, as well as perceived risks and benefits that can inform urban forest management strategies for more resilient cities.
Project Funding: Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship
Partners: City of Maple Ridge, Metro Vancouver
Principal Investigator: Cecil Konijnendijk
The Role of Public Green Spaces in Meeting Urban Forestry Canopy Objectives in Canada
Researcher: Leila Todd
Project Description: This research examines the interactions between municipal park planning and design, and urban forestry/canopy policy in Canada. The research explores emerging trends in park planning and design in Canada to understand if and how urban forest canopy targets are included in policy and implemented on the ground.
Project Funding: UBC 4-Year Fellowship
Principal Investigators: Cecil Konijnendijk, Lorien Nesbitt