Page - 114 - in Biodiversity and Health in the Face of Climate Change

114 to explore, play, discover and engage with nature, all important resources for mental well-being (Chawla 2015). This calls for green spaces that are not perfectly mani- cured but include diverse components of green such as adventure areas, wilderness areas, playgrounds, amongst others. This has been achieved in the development of the park ‘Gleisdreieck’ in the inner city area of Berlin, where local residents also took an active role in shaping and planning their local green space (Kabisch 2015; Rall et  al. 2015). With regard to the social and socio-economic context criteria, Richardson et  al. (2017a, b) showed that children from low-education households had significantly less natural space in their neighbourhoods, and McMorris et  al. (2015) found sig- nificant relationships between greenness and physical activity for all income groups. Increasing levels of greenness do therefore benefit all population groups, which should be taken into consideration in urban planning for future green space development and maintenance (Cook et  al. Chap. 11, Davies et  al. Chap. 12, and Heiland et  al. Chap. 19, all this volume). Roe et  al. (2016) highlighted the fact that particular patterns of use of urban green spaces differ significantly according to different ethnic and gender groups and needs to be considered by planners and policy-makers in a way to steer green space provision appropriately. This suggests that developing new green spaces needs to consider the local context carefully and sensitively. Safety plays a major role in green space use. Urban green space might be avail- able in significant quantity but is not used by the residential population because of safety concerns (Cohen et  al. 2010). Perceived safety concerns and poor environ- mental quality of local green spaces may discourage residents from using these spaces (Dadvand et  al. Chap. 6, this volume). Policy-makers and urban planners should act in these instances to make areas safer and decrease environmental pollution. 5.4.3 Directions for  Future Research Several studies have discussed that exposure and use of urban green space differs according to social and demographic background. Astell-Burt et  al. (2014) dis- cussed that exposure to green space varies in different stages in life and that these differences manifest in health disparities. People of different age groups may have different needs with regard to urban green spaces, which in turn translates into diverse health outcome effects (Roe et  al. 2017). McMorris et  al. (2015) identified an age-specific relationship to green space use for physical activity with significant results for associations between younger adults and women and lower associations with increasing age. In addition, Roe et  al. (2017) showed that the use of green space and perception of green space quality does not only vary by age group but also by deprivation: Whilst younger people (youth) are using nearby green space N. Kabisch