Acceptability of income generation practices in 21st century urban park management: The case of city district parks

Abstract

There is growing interest in understanding the benefits of parks and green space in financial terms, particularly from policymakers and decision-makers. Applying a financial value is an increasingly popular practice designed to communicate urban green space benefits to budget holders. This is pertinent for local governments who routinely struggle to secure funding for parks, given their nonstatutory status around the world. To address this, it is perhaps inevitable that the application of a wide range of funding models to parks is being explored. However, there is little empirical evidence that users and residents share this sentiment. This paper aims to address this gap in knowledge by exploring how feasible and acceptable such income generation practices are for stakeholders directly involved in using and managing parks. We asked local residents, parks managers, community groups and academics in one northern English city how feasible and acceptable they considered different income generation practices if applied to their local parks. The findings showed that overall, income generated by cafés and organised events were considered acceptable by residents but to a lesser extent by community groups and professionals. Voluntary donations, car parking and increased taxation were considered unacceptable by all stakeholders, while using the planning system to secure funding was considered acceptable. The findings suggest a variety of acceptable income-generating practices which may help stakeholders to address pragmatically the current challenges of managing urban parks.

Diversifying Local Government Funding in Implementing Green Open Space for Green City Development: A Systematic Literature Review

“…As presented in Table 3, the three themes are public (3 sub-themes), public-private (4 sub-themes), and community-public-private (5 sub-themes). More specifically, it should be noted that seven previous studies focused on the United Kingdom (UK) local government financial resources (Smith, 2021;Barker et al, 2020;Hayes & Dockerill, 2020;Nam & Dempsey, 2020;Mell, 2020;Dickinson et al, 2019;Mell, 2017) and two studies examined worldwide in general perspective (Toxopeus & Polzin, 2021;Richards & Thompson, 2019) 2017) and six articles employed from review and concept paper (Toxopeus & Polzin, 2021;Barker et al, 2020;Mell, 2020;Dickinson et al, 2019;Richards & Thompson, 2019;Mell, 2017).…”

“…In Liverpool City, they have made taxation as their main financial resources, such as council tax and business tax (Mell, 2020). For this reason, many citizens do not agree if additional taxes are imposed on GOS (Nam & Dempsey, 2020). Similarly, the heterogeneous tax rate (HTR) in the UK is imposed on households that received rain catchment services located in GOS areas so that floods can be prevented (Toxopeus & Polzin, 2021).…”

“…As in Battersea Park in London, UK external funding through commercial activities by privatisation and homogenisation approach is often used as a financial resource for GOS implementation funding Barker et al (2020), as in Potters Fields Park, Southwark which is under the management of the Management Trust, funded through self-financing through events, grants, and donations Smith (2021) and in Gunnersbury Park changed to self-financing parks through commercialisation in 2018 managed by the Community Interest Company (CIC) is more entrepreneurial by social enterprises resulting in most public park areas in London has been temporarily privatised (Smith, 2021). Some commercial activities that are often done in the UK's parks such as ticketed events, entrance fees, cafés, kiosks, shops, and Go Ape (adventure playground with zip wires and rope walks installed in tree-top setting) (Smith, 2021;Barker et al, 2020;Nam & Dempsey, 2020). The weaknesses of commercial activities in Gunnersbury Park and Battersea Park as a result of major events have prevented some local people from using GOS facilities Smith (2021); Barker et al (2020) due to expensive entrance fee Barker et al (2020) and sports facilities that have to be paid for Smith (2021) with varying charges have made the sports facilities are being neglected (Barker et al, 2020).…”

“…Besides that, commercialisation has increased the social gap where only the rich can use the park even though Gunnersbury Park is a public park and according to Smith (2021), it is even worse when private parties such as CIC do not want local people to be involved in the management and maintenance of GOS because they believed local people do not have the expertise. This commercialisation issue also worsens the relationship between local authorities, private organisations, and local communities (Smith, 2021) while the advantage of commercialisation, in Sheffield City activities such as festivals, fun days, and circuses are accepted by many people because they have increased community participation (Nam & Dempsey, 2020) and the large events that are held also promoted GOS to the national and international level (Barker et al, 2020). Furthermore, despite the high price of Go Ape, 64% of the population prefers it and supports this commercial activity as a financial source for local government to fund the management and maintenance of GOS (Smith, 2021).…”

Assessment of Landscape Maintenance Towards Cost Planning: Expert Validation on the Criteria of Sustainable Landscape Maintenance for Public Park

“…The operation and running of maintenance works involve a considerable chunk of the park's management budget. The current landscape practices and Standard Operation Procedure (SOP) in park maintenance may no longer be efficient as it requires a great extent of maintenance (Nam & Dempsey, 2020;R. Ibrahim, 2016;Zainol & Peng Au-Yong, 2016).…”