(Un)just Distribution of Visible Green Spaces? A Socio-Economic Window View Analysis on Residential Buildings: The City of Cologne as Case Study

Abstract

As urbanization processes, climate disasters such as heat waves, or pandemics such as COVID-19, increase, prioritizing visible green space is crucial to provide equitable access to green spaces for vulnerable groups with limited mobility. In the long term, this will enable sustainable and resilient urban development. In this study, we examined green window views in residential buildings to identify patterns of distributive equity for seniors and children, considering their socioeconomic status for the first time. We combined the methodology around the BGWVI and the methodological framework by Huang et al. (Urban Forestry & Urban Greening 95: 128,313:1–128,313:12, 2024) to measure the visibility potential of green spaces for approximately 160,000 residential buildings in order to geostatistically analyze the equity of the spatial distribution of visible urban green spaces. Using the Gini coefficient, the share index, and the location entropy, an evaluation of the access to visible green spaces according to socio-economic status and age group was carried out at the district level for the City of Cologne, Germany. The results show that children and the elderly have slightly higher percentages of visible green space than the social mean percentage. In addition, the influence of the mean net household income on visual green spaces is low. These findings underscore the importance of visibility as an access alternative in urban green space planning for an equitable and resilient urban environment.