Examining Types and Performance of Urban Green Space: Case Studies of Toronto, Milan, and Isfahan

Abstract

Cities have significant impacts on sustainability and sustainable development. In the context of global development, especially in developing large metropolitan areas, the urban population is growing resulting in social and environmental challenges that threaten the sustainability of cities. One of the challenges of this modern urbanization addresses urban green spaces (UGS) regarding their quantity and performance. UGS are essential parts of urban areas lack of which can compromise urban ecology and human well-being. Enhancing UGS is an approach to overcome some of these challenges. Little research has been done on the UGS typologies and different variables affecting their performance, and also the literature on comparing this feature in hugely different contexts is missing. This paper intents to compare UGS categories in the three selected cases, which are the cities of Toronto (Canada), Milan (Italy), and Isfahan (Iran), and analyze their performance variables.