School of Botany - Theses
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ItemUrban landscape structure and the provision of ecosystem services at multiple scales: understanding socio-ecological patterns shaping the development of sustainable cities( 2013)Urbanisation poses a variety of threats to natural resources, especially vegetation which becomes dispersed, fragmented and less abundant, in turn affecting ecological processes and ecosystem services. Vegetation in urban areas is one of the main suppliers of ecosystem services linked to the enhancement of human well-being. Little is known about the quantification of ecosystem services and its linkages to the vegetation structure of urban areas. This research explores some of the key linkages existing between the structure of the urban vegetation and their ecosystem services provision at different scales to test if previous findings at local scale repeat at larger scales and in urban areas that have been less explored. The study hypothesised that the supply of ecosystem services depends on the structure of vegetation which is likely to be a reflection of biophysical, social, political and demographic factors. The understanding of these relationships is critical for enabling informed decision making towards developing sustainable cities. At the local scale, nine ecosystem services maps were produced detecting areas of low and high supply of ecosystem services, as well as their trade-offs and synergies. Fragmentation, population and diversity of languages were found to be the strongest drivers for the provision of ecosystem services. At the regional scale, the provision of recreation potential, carbon mitigation and habitat provision in Melbourne, Perth and Sydney were assessed. Differences between cities were found as a result of a climate gradient that affects both habitat provision and carbon mitigation. Higher temperature and precipitation tended to be related to areas with high provision of habitat and carbon mitigation. Differences within cities were related to fragmentation and shape of the vegetation patches and the strongest drivers were population and temperature. Once again this showed how increased population creates more fragmented landscapes. At the global scale, the study of one hundred cities revealed that recreation potential and habitat provision were related to development and governance, while carbon mitigation was primarily influenced by climate. Recreation potential and carbon mitigation have a synergistic relationship while tradeoffs occurred with both these services and habitat provision. Similar patterns were found when exploring the relationships between vegetation structure and ecosystem services, where more populated, wealthier and more democratic cities are providing more services and better vegetation structure within a certain climatic envelope, confirming results from the broader literature for a wider range of cities. The research represents one of the first attempts to establish linkages between ecosystem services and vegetation structure at multiple scales to increase our understanding of patterns in socio-ecological systems. The findings showed differences according to the level of development, as a reflection of income and education, and constrained by the climate in which the city is located. These results suggest that when establishing targets to achieve sustainable development goals, it is necessary to base them on a city’s climate and available economic resources.