Urban Planning Insights from Tree Inventories and Their Regulating Ecosystem Services Assessment

With the uncertainties that our societies are living with (the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change), it becomes essential to provide urban planners and decision-makers with state-of-the-art and user-friendly methodologies to incorporate ecosystem service considerations into their designs for resilient cities. In this regard, urban forests play a crucial role. The quantification of the ecosystem services is geo-specific and needs studies in different urban contexts. At this scope, we evaluated the urban forest of a neighborhood of a densely built-up Italian city (Perugia) with a low level of urban greenery management and with a tree inventory still in progress. Furthermore, we defined a tool helpful in tree-planting decisions and management. This paper involves citizens in field research for trees inventory. Then, it uses i-Tree Eco to evaluate four ecosystem services (carbon storage and sequestration, pollution removal, and runoff avoided) provided by 373 inventoried urban trees belonging to 57 species. Our results show that Italian Municipal tree inventories do not adequately represent their urban forest and that citizens’ participation provides a cost-effective method for integrating field data. Finally, the paper develops an easy tool helping local administrations enhance the ecosystem services provisions in urban green design.