2012-01: Public greenspace and life satisfaction in urban Australia (Working paper)
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Fleming, Christopher M.
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Nguyen, Tom
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This paper examines the influence of public greenspace on the life satisfaction of residents of Australia's capital cities. A positive relationship is found between the percentage of public greenspace in a resident's local area and their self-reported life satisfaction. On average, it is found that a resident has an implicit willingness-to-pay of $1,168 in annual household income for a one-per-cent (143m2) increase in public greenspace. Additional results suggest that the relationship between public greenspace and life satisfaction is non-linear; that the value of greenspace increases with population density; and that lone parents, as well as the less educated and those living in high rise dwellings, benefit to a greater extent from the provision of public greenspace than the general population. Nevertheless, preferences for greenspace appear to be relatively homogenous. In all, life satisfaction data supports existing evidence that public greenspace is welfare-enhancing for urban residents, and adequate allowance should be made for its provision when planning urban areas.
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Copyright © 2010 by author(s). No part of this paper may be reproduced in any form, or stored in a retrieval system, without prior permission of the author(s).
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Economics and Business Statistics
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Subject
Q51 - Valuation of Environmental Effects
C21 - Single Equation Models; Single Variables: Cross-Sectional Models; Spatial Models; Treatment Effect Models; Quantile Regressions
R20 - Urban, Rural, Regional, and Transportation Economics: Household Analysis: General
Greenspace
non-market valuation
life satisfaction
happiness
Household Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA)
Geographic Information Systems (GIS)