A 2020 report commissioned by the National Trust has shown that the huge surge in people’s use of green spaces during the coronavirus pandemic reveals an inequality of access to nature in many neighbourhoods, towns and cities across the nation. Find out more about the report’s findings and what can be done to address the issues raised.
Easy access to quality green space has become an essential need for urban dwellers, particularly in the aftermath of the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic.
The 2020 report by Vivid Economics and Barton Willmore showed that nearly two-thirds of people have appreciated local green spaces more due to Covid and that they want them to be a higher priority for the government.
Some inner-city parks experienced close to a 300 per cent increase in visits over the spring of 2020. The National Trust also experienced unprecedented visitor numbers to urban fringe sites that we care for.
Greening neighbourhoods, towns and cities also brings a host of wider benefits to people’s lives: improving air quality, reducing summer temperatures and surface flooding, and making cycling and walking even more attractive.
The new research published makes a powerful economic case for significant investment across the UK to introduce green spaces to the country’s greyest urban communities over the next five years.
We partnered with the Mayor of the West Midlands, Sustrans, Create Streets, and local council leaders to write to the Prime Minister and urge for a £5.5 billion commitment to an urban green infrastructure fund, to level up access to urban green space as part of his ‘infrastructure revolution’.
This green infrastructure investment would bring about an estimated £200 billion in physical and mental health benefits, to ease some of the strain on local health service providers and improve people’s quality of life.
Over 20 million people would benefit from this, which is nearly a third of the UK population. Local economies would also see widespread job creation, with an estimated 40,000 jobs created initially and over 6,000 permanently.
Now is the time for the government to be bold and ambitious for the future.
The research mapped the most deprived and greyest areas of Britain. It also looked at the costs and benefits of three steps that are needed to level up access to quality green spaces:
The pandemic exposed deep inequalities in access to green space. Nationally, there are 295 deprived neighbourhoods of 440,000 people that are grey deserts, with no trees or accessible green space.
The study found that black and Asian people visit natural settings 60 per cent less than white people. And in the poorest 20 per cent of households, 46 per cent don’t have a car, so urban parks and green spaces are their only real opportunity to have contact with nature. Typically, rural beauty spots are beyond reach for them.
Examples of the sort of projects that could be created by this national investment include:
These improvements will also help to make cities and towns resilient to climate change, and to achieve net zero ambitions, with this scale of investment delivering one in 12 of the UK’s tree planting target.
The National Trust has offered to assist the government alongside our partners in delivering green infrastructure improvements for the urban communities who need nature the most.
We're an Independent Research Organisation recognised by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI). Our research takes place in many forms – from the PhDs we sponsor and practical testing of new conservation techniques to the hundreds of research projects we collaborate in or host at places in our care each year.
We're working with partners to to give communities more access to nature by planting blossom trees in towns and cities across the UK, so more people can enjoy the beauty and comfort of nature near where they live.
Discover why we joined other leading countryside groups to demand that sensitive places become frack-free zones, in the report Are We Fit to Frack?
Find out what we're doing to connect the places in our care to the communities they serve and make sure that everyone can benefit from nature, beauty and history.
