Local perception of ecosystem services provided by residential green infrastructure within the Rio Piedras watershed

Background/Question/Methods

Urban residential areas provide opportunities for the provision of localized key ecosystem services (ES). In order to improve strategies for green infrastructure management, resident’s preferences and attitudes towards ES need to be considered. Humans have direct (and indirect) impact on socio-ecological characteristics on urban residential areas through management decisions. Increased comprehension on the individual decisions at the household level could improve these strategies as bottom-up characteristics have been suggested to have more influence in yard composition on residential areas. The San Juan ULTRA collaborative project has been evaluating the Rio Piedras Watershed socio-ecological system. As part of these collaborative efforts, this study addressed how ecosystem services and disservices are perceived by local residents within the Rio Piedras Watershed by addressing the following questions: Do residents prefer to have trees on their yard?, What motivates these preferences or dislikes (i.e. what benefits or problems do they attribute to trees)?, Do residents prefer trees in their neighborhoods?, What motivates these preferences or dislikes (i.e. what benefits or problems do they attribute to trees)? To carry out this study, six point locations were selected from the San Juan Urban Long Term Research Area (ULTRA). The criteria for selection of the sites were: the inclusion of a river tributary, population density and general accessibility. The locations of these six sites was based on the representation of a rural-urban gradient of grey coverage, as follows: San Patricio (high urban cover, low elevation), Puerto Nuevo (high urban cover, low elevation, contains old landfill), Avenida Central (low elevation, high urban cover), La Sierra (mid elevation, intermediate urban cover), Caimito (high elevation, low urban cover), and Chiclana (high elevation, low urban cover). A total of 432 households were surveyed using a combination of open-ended and choice questions toward green areas, bodies of water and socio-demographic questions.

Results/Conclusions

We found that perceived benefits were numerous with emphasis on atmospheric/climate services (shade, lower temperature, air purification) followed by provision (food) and cultural services (aesthetic value). The main perceived problems that may be derived from trees relate to maintenance hardship, property damage and power lines obstruction. Ecosystem services perceptions about trees are not equally represented across different spatial scales (household vs. neighborhood levels). Further analysis is currently being performed in order to determine if there are statistical differences among sites, consider cross-scale variations and identify whether there are socioeconomic profiles associated to ecosystem services preferences.