Distributional justice – one of the core dimensions of environmental justice – calls for equity in the distribution of resources that contribute to health and quality of life, such as public parks. While a number of studies have reported disparity in the distribution and quality of urban parks, findings across studies are inconsistent. Additionally, much of the related research has not included high-density cities. This study addressed these issues by examining the associations between the quantity and quality of urban parks and neighborhood-level socioeconomic deprivation and ethnic minorities in the high-density city of Hong Kong.
Trained park auditors used The Community Park Audit Tool (CPAT) to objectively measure the quality of 102 parks in Hong Kong. Components of the CPAT focused on (1) quantity and diversity of active facilities (activity areas for active recreation and sports), (2) diversity and quality of park amenities (picnic tables, benches, etc.), (3) park safety, and (4) park aesthetics (artistic features, trees, etc.) Data accessed from the Hong Kong Population Census were used as a measure of socioeconomic deprivation and to determine the proportion of ethnic minorities in each of the city's tertiary planning units (TPUs), the smallest geographic census-data units in Hong Kong.
Information obtained from the city showed that only one-third of the tertiary planning units (TPUs) contained an urban park. This finding indicates that a large number of people in Hong Kong may not have the opportunity to use parks in their local neighborhoods. Results of the study also showed that the quantity of parks, quality of amenities, park safety, and park aesthetics were not significantly associated with socioeconomic deprivation or ethnic minorities. In fact, deprived areas tended to have more active facilities and supporting amenities within parks than more economically advantaged areas. These results reflect current policies designed to improve equity in parks across Hong Kong. One such policy calls for prioritizing the repair and maintenance of recreational facilities on public rental housing estates instead of private housing estates. Other findings of this study revealed distributional justice issues. For example, the TPUs with higher percentage of ethnic minorities tended to have parks with fewer active facilities and less diversity of active facilities and supporting amenities than parks with a lower percentage of ethnic minorities.
This research adds to the literature by providing evidence of distributional injustice for urban parks in a high-density city. It also provides evidence of how urban planning and policies can be used to improve quality of life in increasingly urbanized societies.
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