Greening neighbourhoods, towns and cities brings a host of benefits to people’s lives: improving air quality, reducing summer temperatures and surface flooding, and making cycling and walking even more attractive. However, the distribution of greenspace is unequal. A 2020 report commissioned by the National Trust had showed that there is an unequal access to nature in many neighbourhoods, towns and cities across the UK.
Easy access to quality green space has become an essential need for urban dwellers, bringing a wide range of benefits. A 2014 roundtable of experts at UCL concluded that better tools and ways of valuing parks that take account of all of those benefits are needed. Much work has been developed since then to fill those gaps, such as the 2023 work commissioned by the WHO. As a further research area, they recommend the application of the wellbeing valuation approach to value urban greenspaces. Specifically, by conducting a pre-/post-intervention evaluation of the wellbeing of residents using appropriate measures of wellbeing.
Simetrica-Jacobs is proud to assist Carbon Heroes on its journey of bringing back greenspaces to urban areas by playing a role in developing a tool to assist in demonstrating the value that urban greenspaces bring to local communities.
Our work explored the direct and indirect (through an improvement in health) wellbeing benefits of air pollution (NO₂, PM2.5, and PM10) interception by tree canopies. The value was derived from NHS National Cost Collection data and Defra air quality damage cost guidance, capturing the downstream benefits of avoided GP visits associated with the pollution reduction.
Our work has enabled Carbon Heroes to provide credible, evidence-backed social value metrics within its platform, strengthen the case for nature-based solutions in procurement and bridge the gap between corporate commitments and real-world delivery.
Leveraging our expertise in wellbeing valuation, Simetrica-Jacobs hopes to play a role in filling some of the gaps in evidencing the value that urban greenspaces have on wellbeing, allowing for a comprehensive assessment of the value of urban greenspaces.
