•We assess benefits and well-being deriving from visiting urban and peri-urban green areas.•We examine how biodiversity of urban and peri-urban green areas affects well-being.•Biodiversity positively ...affects well-being, especially for urban green areas.•Length of visit to green areas and biodiversity predict well-being through the mediation of perceived restorativeness.•Urban green spaces rich in biodiversity can enhance well-being and promote sustainable lifestyles.
The literature on human experience in green environments had widely showed the positive outcomes of getting in contact with nature. This study addresses the issue of whether urban residents’ evaluations of urban and peri-urban natural settings and the positive outcomes deriving from contact with such settings vary as a function of their biodiversity. A field study assessed benefits and subjective well-being reported by urban residents visiting four different typologies of green spaces, selected on the basis of urban forestry expert criteria according to a 2×2 factorial design. The biodiversity level (low vs. high) was crossed with the setting location (urban vs. peri-urban) as follows: urban squares with green elements, urban parks, pinewood forest plantations, and peri-urban natural protected areas. A questionnaire including measures of length and frequency of visits, perceived restorativeness, and self-reported benefits of the visit to the green spaces was administered in situ to 569 residents of four Italian medium-to-large size cities: Bari, Florence, Rome and Padua. Results showed the positive role of biodiversity upon perceived restorative properties and self-reported benefits for urban and peri-urban green spaces. Consistently with the hypotheses reported herein, a mediation role of perceived restorativeness in the relation between experience of natural settings (i.e. higher level of biodiversity) and self-reported benefits was found. The design and management implications of the findings are discussed.
Site conditions and forest management affect dendrometric parameters of chestnut (Castanea sativa Mill.) coppices, but there is modest knowledge on the effect of stand dendrometric characters on ...physical and mechanical wood characteristics. The aim of this study was to verify these relationships in chestnut coppices that were 12-14 years old. Wood density, compression and bending strength, shrinkages were measured on shoots of five different stand in a vulcanic site in Monte Amiata (Central - Italy). Investigated stands differ in number of stools/ha and dominant height, diameter/basal area of the shoots. The main difference in the physical characters among the stands is density. The initial results of the study showed that physical, mechanical wood characters are more dependent by the shoot than by the site. There is a positive relationships between the number of stools/ha and density and a negative one among shoot dominant height and basal area with wood density. Spectroscopic profile by FTIR has not showed relevant differences among the stands. Wood anatomy has showed the breakpoint at cellular level.
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•We assess benefits gaigned visiting urban woodlands through quantile regression models.•Being-away, fascination, compatibility are good predictors of psychological benefits.•Density ...of understory shows a negative association with self-reported benefits.•No association was found between size of dominant trees and self-reported benefits.
Forests are widely recognized as important landscape elements which contribute to human health and well-being. They provide benefits derived from direct and indirect experiences of contact with nature by reducing psychological and physical stress, thus creating positive feelings and facilitating the recovery of psychological resources. In order to establish or manage forests for recreational purposes, it is essential to know which forest stand structure features and indicators are linked to actual or perceived psychological restoration. The aim of this study is to evaluate the association between individual factors, perceived restorativeness, stand structure attributes and self-reported physical-psychological benefits obtained when visiting woodlands in urban or peri-urban areas especially coastal Italian stone pine forests using a quantile regression approach. Perceived restorativeness components such as ‘being-away’, ‘fascination’ and ‘compatibility’ emerged as significant predictors of visitors’ perceived psychological benefits, showing a positive and significant association in all of the quantiles under study. Stand density, measured by basal area per hectare of understory trees and shrubs negatively influences the perception of the benefits obtained, holding constant the other covariates.
Climate change has become one of the most critical problems facing modern society. Sustainable forest management can be an important solution to counter the increasing concentration of carbon dioxide ...in the atmosphere. In particular, management of the chestnut forest could prove to be an effective strategy to absorb carbon dioxide as this species is characterized by sustained growth, so it has a high capacity to store carbon, and through the use of wood products, it is possible to sequester it for a considerable period. Chestnut (Castanea sativa Mill.) forests cover an area of about 800,000 ha in Italy, most of which is managed as coppice. It plays a central role in the Latium Region where its productive function is very important, as it provides timber of excellent quality. The purpose of this paper is to verify whether the current management of chestnut is efficient, as well as whether retractable wood products can contribute to the fight against climate change. The chestnut coppice located in the municipality of Tolfa (Lazio region, Italy) produces timber for 352 m3/ha and stores about 390,000 kg of CO2. Wood residues and losses during woodworking, together with emissions for the use of machineries, generate emissions of 368,000 kg of CO2. The chestnut semi-finished products, with long-term use prospects, retain a net volume of 22,000 kg of CO2. Although this is good for combating climate change, the amount of CO2 stored is very low, less than 6% of the CO2 stored by functional unit. Chestnut wood has a high versatility of use, so it could replace several products generated by fossil raw materials. Moreover, the implementation of precision forestry, the adoption of forest management more oriented to favor larger plants, the development of local economies and the reduction in the carbon footprint of the wood supply chain through the use of sustainable technologies would increase the capacity for climate change mitigation and increase the added value of its products.
Botanical gardens represent interesting arenas for research in environmental psychology and environment-behavior relations. They can be considered a very particular type of restorative environment ...and also have a relevant social function for the promotion of a more sustainable lifestyle in current societies. In this paper, we present a study assessing the relationship between the perceived restorativeness, the psychological and physical benefits experienced, and the subjective well-being reported by visitors of botanical gardens in four different cities in Italy (
= 127). As expected, a bootstrapping mediation model supported the idea that perceived restorativeness of botanical gardens significantly predicts visitors' subjective well-being, both directly and indirectly through perceived physical and psychological benefits of the visit. A moderation model also revealed that the relationship between restorativeness and well-being varies across respondents with different socio-demographic characteristics, being stronger for singles as compared to couples with and without children, respectively. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed.
In some geographical areas of North America and Southeast Asia cities are frequently hit by heavy windstorms capable of knocking down hundreds of urban trees and large branches in a few minutes. ...Falling trees generate a broad array of disservices that vary over time and space. In Europe and worldwide the frequency of these extreme weather events has increased in recent decades and climate change could intensify these windstorms while the effects of urban land expansion could increase the extent of damage. However, Europe’s urban populations are unprepared for extreme weather events and are unable to limit the effects that the widespread loss of trees over limited space and time can have on people, buildings and city road networks. Preparing for rare, extreme future events that could strongly affect urban green infrastructures is a demanding challenge for city dwellers and for those who should ensure the continuity of the ecosystem services provided by urban trees. In fact, the damage caused by fallen trees is combined with the loss of the benefits provided by the trees themselves. Therefore the aim of this paper is to: (a) investigate the disruptions that a windstorm can cause in an urban area full of trees using a conceptual model; (b) conduct a literature review to determine how high the risk of these disservices occurring in Europe really is, which is definitely more likely than commonly perceived and could increase as a result of climate change and; (c) indicate what kind of measures can be taken in European cities to prevent or at least reduce the risks from falling urban trees during a strong windstorm, starting from the experience gained in the geographical areas most frequently and intensely affected by this type of weather event.
Sustainability and ecotoxicity issues call for innovations regarding eco-friendly adhesives in the production of biocomposite wood materials, and solutions involving nano-scale and bio-based ...compounds represent a valid and promising target. One possible approach is to increase the performance of adhesives such as polyvinyl acetate (PVAc) or melamine-urea-formaldehyde (MUF) by means of nanoparticles in order to obtain a material with better mechanical and environmental resistance. When applying cellulose-based nanoparticles or tannin, the concept of a circular economy is successfully implemented into the forest/wood value chain, and chances are created to develop new value chains using byproducts of forestry operations. In this study, assortments coming from young sweet chestnut (
Mill.) coppice stands were utilized for the preparation of single lap joint assemblies using different commercial adhesives (PVAc, MUF) and cellulose nanocrystals (CNC) and tannin as additives. The results showed that addition of CNC and tannin to PVAc glue increased tensile shear strength in lap joint tests presenting a promising base for future tests regarding the addition of CNC and tannin in MUF or PVAc adhesive formulations. Unfortunately, the tested bio-based additives did not reveal the same encouraging results when tested in the wet state.
This review presents a multidisciplinary framework for integrating the ecological, regulatory, procedural and technical aspects of forest management for fires prevention under Mediterranean ...environments. The aims are to: i) provide a foreground of wildfire scenario; ii) illustrate the theoretical background of forest fuel management; iii) describe the available fuel management techniques and mechanical operations for fire prevention in forest and wildland-urban interfaces, with exemplification of case-studies; iv) allocate fire prevention activities under the hierarchy of forest planning. The review is conceived as an outline commentary discussion targeted to professionals, technicians and government personnel involved in forestry and environmental management.
This paper reviews the literature relating to the relationship between light availability in the understory and the main qualitative and quantitative attributes of stand overstory usually considered ...in forest management and planning (species composition, density, tree sizes, etc.) as well as their changes as consequences of harvesting. The paper is divided in two sections: the first one reviews studies which investigated the influence of species composition on understory light conditions; the second part examines research on the relationships among stand parameters determined from dendrometric field data and the radiation on understory layer. The objective was to highlight which are the most significant stand traits and management features to build more practical models for predicting light regimes in any forest stand and, in more general terms, to support forest managers in planning and designing silvicultural treatments that retain structure in different way in order to meet different objectives.
The paper provides a summary regarding the current state of silviculture and the use of sweet chestnut wood (Castanea sativa Mill.) in Italy. Existing opportunities for chestnut silviculture are very ...promising because sweet chestnut covers nearly 800,000 hectares in Italy, representing almost 2.6% of the total area of the country, including 7.5% of national forest areas. In some geographic areas, especially in central-southern Italy, sweet chestnut is the only driver of the sawmill economy. In Italy, this species is typically harvested to produce solid beams and poles. In the field of load-bearing structures, research and innovation in silviculture have provided solutions to the growing use of industrial technologies, and sweet chestnut has become integrated into European standards with the same relevanceas the most commonly most used wood species, such as Norway spruce. However, diversification in wood products is lacking in regions that produce sweet chestnut, as the sawmills tend to be very chestnut-centric, and in terms of the types of final products sweet chestnut is applied to. The typical end uses for sweet chestnut represents a major weakness associated with the massive exploitation of chestnut wood. In addition, the production of sawmills in Italy has decreased recently due to the crisis-driven reductions inactivity. This transition has affected the traditional building sector. The most common wood quality defects associated with sweet chestnut, which limit the use of this species for other wood products, are well known by producers. To boost the demand for this wood, efforts must be made to identify more versatile uses for this wood, promoting differential forest management systems to obtain stems that can be utilised in other types of final products. A list of possible actions is considered to increase the applications for this species, which represents one of the best opportunities to develop a short supply chain.
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