Role of Urban Green Spaces of Educational Institutions in Shaping Sustainable Cities: A Case Study of Shivamogga City, India

From last few decades every Indian city is under the stress of urbanization. In the urbanizing scenario vegetation within urban regions play crucial role in maintaining microclimate of cities. As urban areas expand the significance of conserving and incorporating vegetation into urban landscapes is prime important for urban sustainability. This paper focused on the benefits and need of “urban green space” in urban environment. The important roles played by urban green space are ecological, social, economic, and aesthetic aspects which are very much needed for urban sustainability. Especially trees in urban green spaces, act as habitat for fauna, natural air purifiers, reducing the heat and also helps in climate change miigation by carbon sequestration. This contributes to enhanced air quality; reduce the severity of urban pollution on environmental health. Urban green spaces with trees enhance property value through aesthetic appeal and reduce energy costs associated with cooling buildings. In this context, to understand the significance of urban green spaces in developing cities a research study is undertaken to known the diversity, the carbon sequestration potential and the socio-economic contribution of trees in urban green space of educational institutions of Shivamogga city. Total 681 tree individuals in 11 selected educational institutions of Shivamogga city is recorded during field survey. The field survey and documented data reveals the presence of 68 different tree species belonging to 29 different families. Fabaceae dominated the list with 13 genus and 13 species. Total Carbon Sequestration estimation is 133924.3 tons/ha. Total Carbon Sequestration is more in Polyalthia longifolia(24570.62 tons/ha) followed by Peltophorum pterocarpum(16154.26tons/ha), Spathodea campanulata (15093.94 tons/ha), Tectona grandis(14912.04 tons/ha). The results of questionnaire showed that majority of respondents’ strongly aware about ecological, health, and social benefits provided by trees in green spaces of their institutions and also supports need of still better planning and management strategies for more benefits. Thus, there is a need of more focus on such urban green spaces for better understanding their significant role in maintaining urban sustainability.