Urban Park Accessibility and Inequality Across 1,028 Global Cities

A 2026 study by Haoran Ma assesses urban park accessibility across 1,028 cities worldwide using a supply-and-demand aware method. The data reveals that park accessibility in Global North cities is 5.67 times higher than in Global South cities, with a global Gini coefficient of 0.657 for 15-minute walkability. The findings quantify inequality and model the impact of new park placement on reducing disparities.

Use Cases

• Modeling the relationship between park supply and accessibility inequality based on the described U-shaped effect.
• Comparing urban green space equity between Global North and Global South cities based on the reported 5.67x disparity.
• Calculating Gini coefficients for service accessibility within cities based on the provided global metric of 0.657.
• Planning park locations to optimize for per-capita access based on the described 15-20 minute optimal impact range.

Strengths

• Covers a large global scale of 1,028 cities.
• Provides specific, quantified metrics such as a 5.67x accessibility disparity and a Gini coefficient of 0.657.
• Analysis is based on a described 'supply-and-demand aware method' for assessing accessibility.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment for specific analytical tasks.

Provenance

Source

figshare, author Haoran Ma.

Collection Method

Assessed using a supply-and-demand aware method, as described.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-04-25 02:03:57; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Global, covering 1,028 cities worldwide.