Little is known regarding the significance for local people of peri-urban national parks as recreational areas. The main goal of the present article is to evaluate the social impact and importance of peri-urban parks for visitors as a green space for outdoor recreation. For this investigation on-site, face-to-face interviews were conducted. The main reason for visiting NP are: “to be near to nature” (64.71%), “to practice sport” (58.09%) and “relaxing” (43.38%). Spending time in NP is considered by most interviewed people to be of crucial importance both for physical (96.32%) and for mental (83.82%) health. It should be noted that high frequency of park visits was reported only by young, employed and well-educated people. Data collected shows that park management plan should encourage low-income groups (unemployed and elderly) to use outdoor recreation as a part of preventive healthcare. The access for older adults, people with disabilities and children to the park should be facilitated. Services like access to clean water, toilets and seating places must be improved. The data from the authors' survey could be useful for the peri-urban national parks development as green spaces for promoting health among all demographic groups of local inhabitants.

Increasing attention has been paid recently to soil pollution. The aim of this study was to evaluate the ecological risk of soils collected from Nature Park Shumen Plateau (Bulgaria) (NP) using physicochemical and cytogenetic approaches (pH analysis, analysis of the content of heavy metals included in Bulgarian soil pollution standards, and Allium cepa-test). Soil samples from NP were collected from seven sites. A sample from a heavily anthropogenic-influenced urban site was also collected. As signs for environmental risk used pH values, we found total concentration of heavy metals and mitotic abnormalities in Allium cepa root meristems included in Bulgarian legislation. Only two samples from NP were found to be slightly acidic. The other samples have slightly alkaline pH. The highest pH value was obtained in the urban sample. Heavy metal concentrations did not exceeded national standards for soil pollution. Several NP samples and urban samples exerted cytotoxic and genotoxic effects in Allium root meristems. Our data on soil pH and heavy metal concentrations did not indicate potential ecological risk, but cytogenetic endpoints showed the presence of harmful compounds in studied areas. In conclusion, the ecological risk for the investigated suburban area may be assessed as moderate.

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The green areas play a significant role in keeping the urban population healthy. Consequently, there has been a growing interest in the urban and peri-urban parks lately. The Nature Park Shumen plateau and Shumen City Park are an important green area for residents of Shumen city. The aim of this study was to make comparative analysis of the qualities of the Nature Park Shumen Plateau and the Shumen City Park as green spaces. For quality assessment 10 criteria were used. The criteria were grouped in four categories - Green space placement, Green space use, Environment and Biodiversity. Five-point Likert scale was used to determine satisfaction with each of the 10 criteria. Nine experts did the evaluation of the criteria. In category “Green space placement”, the Nature Park Shumen Plateau and the Shumen City Park had very similar evaluations however there were big differences in the individual criteria. According to the category “Green space use, both parks showed rather similar results. Concerning the category „Environment”, the Nature Park Shumen Plateau received slightly higher assessment and the category “Biodiversity” was ranked as twice higher. The results show that the Nature Park Shumen Plateau and the Shumen City Park possess good quality as a green area, as the Nature Park Shumen Plateau was higher assessed compared to the Shumen City Park.

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