Researchers at the School of the Built Environment have been working on a project to identify where the green spaces are in England's urban areas.
The project was run by the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment (CABE), and the results have been published in a report called Urban Green Nation.
The report looked into how green spaces are used by the communities that surround them and also studied the variations in quality and quantity of these areas across regions. It found that there was disparity relating to socio-economic backgrounds and minority ethnic groups, with deprived areas having poorer access to green spaces and the facilities that they did have were of poorer quality.
The report also found a very high level of public involvement and engagement with 9 out of 10 people using and valuing parks and green spaces.
The report will help to measure any changes in urban green spaces in the future and has identified some of the issues that need to be addressed in future policy and regeneration. Further research will be undertaken to look at income and race inequalities in access to green spaces and the benefit that these open spaces have in tackling social disadvantage.
For more information, read the Urban Green Nation: building the evidence base report.