Equality in access to urban green spaces: A case study in Hannover, Germany, with a focus on the elderly population

Although assessing green space provisions is essential to understand environmental justice, few studies have focused on the age perspective and the inequality in access regarding elderly people. This study aims at understanding the spatial disparity in access to urban green and blue infrastructure (UGBI), with a special focus on the elderly. An enhanced “2SFCA” approach was applied to measure the per capita UGBI area by considering different vegetation types and water elements, natural attractiveness, street network, and the many-to-many relationship between the supply and demand locations. Using a case study in Hannover, Germany, this study applied two different “assumptions” of distance thresholds (the near proximity assumption and the far proximity assumption) of UGBI. Our case study showed that in Hannover, elderly people are generally not disadvantaged in their access to UGBI compared with other age groups, but that the degree of accessibility differs between neighborhoods considered. The study also showed that access limitations can be partly compensated by increasing the mobility of the elderly so that they can reach high quality green spaces located farther away. The findings recommend key locations for allocating green spaces and improving the connection between residential areas and UGBI.