Article Reference: Green Plants for Green Buildings

Submitted for the 2002 People/Plant Symposium

Amsterdam, Netherlands

By Kathleen L. Wolf, Ph.D.

Center for Urban Horticulture

University of Washington

Abstract

Interviews and surveys evaluated public preferences, perceptions, patronage behavior intentions and product willingness to pay in relationship to varied presence of trees in outdoor retail environments. Consumer response is positively associated with streetscape and retail environment greening on all of these evaluative and behavioral dimensions.

Since the beginning of history people have gathered to exchange goods and services. From the agora, to the market, to "main street" places of commerce have been sites of complex interpersonal interaction. The multiple, daily human contacts of a retail environment or market centers are a part of the social fabric of any city or town. Commerce is a unique situation of human ecology, and one that has rarely been explored in studies of plant and nature benefits.

In Street Reclaiming Engwicht (1999) observes that “streets were historically a place of ‘spontaneous exchange’ – defined as the sharing of goods, culture, knowledge, friendship and support – all the commodities that make up our commercial and social economy.” The life and commerce of city streets and urban nature has been altered radically with the development of strip malls, shopping malls, mail order alternatives, and the electronic shopping options provided by the computer, telephone, and fax. As U.S. growth management practices are implemented local retail districts are making efforts to revitalize and regain their competitive retail position.

Physical improvements are made to recreate pedestrian-friendly, human scale streetscapes, in addition to restoring shops and infrastructure. In a vital pedestrian-oriented retail center the streetscape provides habitat consumer for shoppers and customers who have diverse needs and goals. Habitat can be defined as the “place where an organism or a community of organisms lives (and exists), including all living and nonliving factors or conditions of the surrounding environment (Encyclopedia Britannica, 2002).”

Habitat, in the ecological sense, provides the basic needs of food, water and shelter for any given species. Retail business or streetscape districts must also provide basic consumer needs in order to be successful. Consumers are likely to gravitate to “horticulture habitats” that offer favorable climate, high potential for social interaction, perceptions of safety, and a large, diverse selection of goods and services (Bloch et al. 1994).

Landscape ecologists have teamed with wildlife biologists to study the spatial configuration of landscape that is conducive to habitat and biodiversity. The connectivity of basic needs is as important as their availability. As the world becomes more urbanized wildlife corridors and land patches are essential for providing animal access to life’s necessities. In an analogous way spatial access to consumer needs is just as important as primary shopping destinations in a business district. The retail centers or streetscape districts provides connectivity among shops, enabling (and encouraging) consumers to pursue their retail interests in multiple settings.