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Nature experiences and active mobility both deliver well-being and health benefits but have rarely been investigated together. Conceptualizations of nature experiences largely focus on intention, and the planned motivations for visits. However, nature experiences can also be perceived incidentally, if daily living activities like trips are encouraged towards green spaces. In a public participation GIS (PPGIS) survey of five local districts in Copenhagen, 517 respondents mapped 688 places along their walking or cycling shortcut trips through green spaces. This study investigated what types of green space provide opportunities for such shortcuts, what incidental nature experiences can be perceived there and the different responses of pedestrians and cyclists. This study also explored the relation between incidental nature experiences and green space characteristics in the form of tree cover density. Lastly, this study explored whether frequent short trips through green spaces relate to nature connectedness. The results show that public green spaces and urban cemeteries in Copenhagen allow for such shortcut trips. Enjoyment of pleasing views is the most perceived incidental nature experience. Pedestrians are found more prone to experience surprise, inspiration and emotion, while cyclists prefer shortcuts close to water, which they value highly. The study suggests that high tree cover density is key to delivering incidental nature experiences. Furthermore, the study shows that people who make frequent trips through green spaces have higher levels of nature connectedness, indicating that incidental nature experiences during shortcut trips trigger the reconnection of people and nature. The study's results support a synergistic approach to integrating green spaces and active mobility in planning and management practice, where incidental nature experiences should be emphasized.

Coastal zones are important for recreational activities and waterbirds. However, recreational activities may have negative implications for birdlife, which calls for balancing of both types of use by integrated coastal and marine planning and management. Successful integrated management and planning require spatiotemporal knowledge about the species needing protection and the outdoor recreation activities. This paper examines water-oriented outdoor recreation in Denmark in terms of activities, seasonality and geographical distribution, and presents a national screening of spatiotemporal overlap between coastal and marine recreational activities and waterbirds based on 10,291 responses and 6,499 geographical positions. In total 77.6% of the Danish population participated in water-oriented outdoor recreation activities at least once within a year. The most frequent activities were to move along or stay on the coast/shore (63.9%), to bathe and swim (34.4%) and to observe nature and wildlife (20.3%). Overlap between recreation and waterbirds, representing potential conflicts, ranged from 0.8% in winter on water to 27.7% in summer on the coast. The results revealed significant negative effects between recreational activities and abundance of waterbirds during spring and summer on the water. The results also indicate that most recreational activities use areas with no or low densities of waterbirds. Successful coastal and marine planning requires application of management tools that include educational and interpretative initiatives to enhance coexistence. However, for detailed management, more studies are urgently needed of spatiotemporal patterns, adaptations, conflicts and coexistence between recreational activity and waterbirds. Management implications The results support integrated planning and management of water-based recreation in conjunction with waterbirds by: - Providing spatially explicit year-round data on recreational and waterbird use of coastal and marine areas. - Obtaining the first ever national overview of potential areas of conflict and of possibilities for coexistence between coastal and marine recreation and waterbirds. - Identifying specific local areas in need of management action and more detailed studies of effects and impacts of coastal and marine recreation on waterbirds.

Regional integration can contribute to co-occurring benefits of different parts of an urban agglomeration by managing these parts as a whole. However, current regional integration mainly focuses on the socioeconomic rather than the ecological dimension. To interpret regional ecological integration, we firstly selected six typical ecosystem services (ESs) to represent ecological benefits that potentially need to be improved by ecological integration for further analysis. Then we used ES budgets, bundles, and flows to investigate the potential, basic analysis unit, and occurring manners of ecological integration, respectively. Our results show that supply-demand mismatches were observed in all the ES types. Meanwhile, coexisting ES surpluses and deficits on the town scale were found in supporting biodiversity, soil retention, water yield, green space recreation, and crop yield, which indicates that their supply-demand mismatches can be mitigated with ecological integration. Furthermore, all the towns were classified into five spatial clusters with distinct ES budget bundles, which acted as the basic analysis unit of ecological integration. ES flows with three flow characteristic types were observed between different clusters, and all the clusters had ES provider-beneficiary relationships with each other. Based on the ES approach, we provided an ecological perspective for understanding regional integration, which has the potential to promote regional ecological sustainability.

This study applies micro-level transport survey data to assess the significance of Bikeability variables on the probability of cycling in trips to or from residential and workplace locations. The data and analysis were prepared to include measures at different spatial scales, including measures of density/accessibility and infrastructure provision for network distances from up to 1 km to up to 5 km from the origin of a trip, as well as the regional position of the city. The probability of cycling is affected by urban structure variables at the local, urban and regional scale. The local scale, which includes the positive effects from population density and cycling infrastructures, is the most important in influencing cycling, but there are substantial additional contributions from access to retail and train stations within a range of 3–4 km, as well as from the relative size of the city within the region. The effect of the regional scale most likely reflects the reliance upon motorized modes to connect to distant important nodes. Factors at the local, urban and regional scales may pull cycling in opposite directions and thus all need to be considered to adequately assess the possibilities for promoting cycling in an urban area or neighbourhood.

It is the objective of the study to determine the extent to which human navigation is affected by perceptions of our immediate surroundings or by already established knowledge in terms of a cognitive map. The motivation is to contribute to the knowledge about human navigation and to inform planning with estimates of bicyclists’ route preferences and ‘willingness-to-pay’ (in terms of transport distance vs. utility/disutility of route characteristics). The core method is choice modelling of observed route data. Thousand two hundred and sixty seven trips performed by 183 cyclists in Copenhagen (Denmark) were recorded by GPS. The trips were map-matched to a digital road and path network, which enabled the generation of choice sets: one for navigation as influenced by perception of immediate surroundings, comprising edges connected to network-nodes (hereafter called the edge dataset), and one for navigation based on a priori knowledge, comprising the trip itself and a number of alternative routes gener...

Studies of visitors' preferences for forest environments play a central role for the understanding of recreational behaviour. The encounter of other agents, such as wildlife or other visitors, has proven important for preferences, and this is something visitors may affect themselves. Thus, this study focusses on forest visitors’ preferences for forest environments and potential encounters with other agents. 1089 respondents have been asked to consider a choice for change of direction at trail junctions, during a visit to the forest, by ranking five cards representing possible path segments. Each segment constituted a given forest environment (represented by text and a photo) and agent types and numbers (text and an icon), and the direction (text only) – relative to a preferred direction. Results show that on average respondents will detour from their preferred direction, disregarding the forest environment, to experience wildlife. At the other end of the scale, larger groups of mountain bikers or runners can make respondents detour in all forest environments, except for the most preferred ones, to avoid an encounter. Based on a latent class analysis three classes are identified with distinct preferences. 20% of the respondents are unlikely to detour no matter the possible forest environment or agent types. 30% are not affected by encountering other agents, but are to a slight but significant extent affected by the forest environment. The majority, constituting 50% of the population, is strongly influenced by forest environments and even more by potential encounters with other agents. Results largely confirm earlier studies using an ordinal scale, but in addition, we estimate the mutual strength of the preferences and thereby allowing for better guidance of how to manage for forest recreation. Management implications In our study, a large group of people state that encountering other types of visitors or wild life matters a lot, and often overrules, the diverse utility of different forest environments. This highlights the necessity of focusing on the management trade-offs between nature conservation and recreational use.

The coordinated supply and demand of ecosystem services (ESs) is important for ensuring regional sustainable development. However, research identifying key areas of imbalanced supply and demand of ESs at the urban agglomeration scale is limited. Therefore, in this study, using the Fujian Delta urban agglomeration of China as the research area, based on multi-source data, and analysis tools, such as ArcGIS, ENVI, and GeoDa, we constructed a research framework and indicator system for ESs supply and demand to determine the spatial change law, matching degree, and coupling coordination degree (CCD) of the ESs. On this basis, the key areas of imbalanced supply and demand of ESs were identified, and optimization strategies were proposed. The results showed that (1) there is obvious spatial heterogeneity between ESs supply and demand in the study area, and different degrees of spatial changes occurred with urbanization. Specifically, areas with large changes were concentrated in urban core areas and economic development zones. (2) The matching degree between ESs supply and demand is quite diverse and shows a trend of polarization. Under the influence of urbanization, some cities began facing ESs supply shortages. (3) Overall, the CCD between ESs supply and demand in the study area is in a state of mild incoordination, but with increasing urbanization, some cities have turned into a state of extreme incoordination. Our results indicate that the ESs supply and demand status in some cities at the urban agglomeration scale has become increasingly severe. Therefore, it is necessary to focus on certain "key areas" to formulate optimization strategies. For key areas with "low supply-high demand" and extreme incoordination, the population and land use intensity should be controlled to reduce the ESs demand level. Meanwhile, for key areas with "high supply-low demand" and extreme incoordination, the utilization efficiency of ecological resources should be improved to enhance the ESs supply capacity. The results of this study will help decision-makers optimize the relationship between ESs supply and demand in order to achieve the sustainable development of urban agglomeration.

To mitigate environmental problems and provide ecosystem services (ESs), afforestation projects have been implemented all over the world. However, how to maximize the benefits and minimize the costs of afforestation is still challenging. In this study, we developed a methodology using the cost-benefit analysis (CBA) to identify the potential areas for afforestation (PAAs). Using the Grain for Green Project (GFGP) in the Jinan Planning Zone, China, as a case study, we identified the increase in five ecosystem services (habitat quality, carbon sequestration, soil retention, water conservation, and reduction in non-point source pollution) as the potential benefit and farmland suitability as the potential cost, and used the benefit-cost ratio as the criterion of the PAAs identification. Moreover, we set three GFGP scenarios (mild, moderate, and strong scenarios) according to the GFGP intensity, and compared the PAAs identified by the CBA and those identified by the slope degree method (SDM), which is widely used in the practical GFGP. Based on our methodology and case study, we proposed a decision-making framework for the identification of the PAAs that can be used in different regions. The results show that ES increases and farmland suitability indicators exhibited spatial heterogeneity. Some extremely high values of the comprehensive ES increase were found in the southeast, while low values of comprehensive farmland suitability were aggregated in the northwestern plain. In all the GFGP scenarios, compared with the SDM, the CBA can identify the PAAs with higher benefits at lower costs, which indicates the advantages and stability of the CBA. In the strong scenario, the mean benefit-cost ratio of the PAAs identified by the CBA was 20.82% higher than that of the PAAs identified by the SDM. Overall, the PAAs identification from the cost-benefit perspective can contribute to delicate afforestation management especially when resources are limited.

Objective The objective of the present study is to investigate the effects of improvements made to two large, interconnected bicycle infrastructure in the western suburbs of Copenhagen, Denmark, on bicycle volumes and mode share, and cyclists' behaviour, perceptions, and experiences. Methods Effects are assessed by analysing data from automatic counting stations during 35 months to measure the changes in bicycle volumes on the investigated routes. Furthermore, a questionnaire survey repeated three times – before, and one and two years after opening the improved routes - is used. Findings are supported by a control survey at a nearby facility, which was not influenced by the infrastructure improvements. Results The investments related to the two investigated cases of infrastructure improvements resulted in a significant increase in the volume of bicyclist two years after the improvements. On one of the routes, the “Albertslund Route”, on weekdays during the rush hour in daylight, an increase from 126 to 203 bicyclists/h was recorded, whereas an increase from 24 to 32 bicyclists/h was recorded at “Vestvolden” for the same period. Most of the increase could be attributed to relocation of bicyclists from other routes. Induced cycling trips – trips that were not previously made by bicycle - were estimated to account for only 4–5% of the bicyclists two years after improvements. Bicyclists using the improved route express an increase in satisfaction with the quality of the facilities, which is significantly higher than at the control site. Conclusion Data from the counting stations provides useful information if measured over a long period. This is necessary to correct for factors such as climate effects and temporal variation. Investments in cycle infrastructure in the investigated case led to a higher number of bicyclists who were mainly relocated from other routes. A minor increase in the modal share of cyclists was observed two years after the infrastructure improvements. Furthermore, the investments resulted in a higher degree of satisfaction among active bicyclists. If measured over a longer period, this could lead to a higher modal share due to a potential social advertising effect.

Cycling as a mode of transportation is increasingly being advocated due to the many positive effects it has on people’s health, the environment and to counteract increasing congestion on the transportation infrastructure. There is a long tradition of using cycling as a mode of transportation among the Danish public and this is widespread across people with different socio-demographic characteristics. Copenhagen has an extensive network of cycling facilities and is often used as a role model for other large cities when developing cycling facilities. This setting provides a unique basis for investigating bicycle commuters’ preferences for route characteristics and crowding in particular, which is not studied before, but likely to become an issue around the world’s cities with increases in number of bicyclists. The study is based on a choice experiment of 3891 active cyclists in Copenhagen. The investigated attributes are cycle track, crowding, stops, environment/road type, green surroundings, and travel distance which is used as a payment vehicle to gain more desirable route characteristics. On average people state that they are willing to cycle 1.84 km longer if the route has a designated cycle track, and 0.8 km more if there are green surroundings too. Stops and crowding, based on number of cyclists on the route, have significant negative impacts on people’s utility of a given route. People were willing to cycle one kilometre longer to avoid high levels of crowding and approximately 1.3 km longer to avoid routes with many stops. The most attractive road environment is a segregated path only for cyclists closely followed by shopping street. Looking into heterogeneity, we find that people who own a car have less disutility of cycling additional distance. The results may support future decision making when creating new infrastructure for cycling in cities by addressing the perceived importance of facilities and crowding in a population where commute cycling is very widespread.

In Western Europe agricultural management was intensified in the period 1950–2010 with negative consequences for ecosystem services, such as pollination, especially in countries with a large proportion of agriculture. Farmland represents 66% of the Danish landscape, but little is known about wild bees despite that 75% of the country’s wild and cultivated plant species depend on insect pollination. Strawberry (Fragaria × ananassa) gains considerable benefits from insect pollination and abundance, species richness and functional diversity, are all important elements. We surveyed the diversity of wild bees during strawberry flowering by sampling bees with pan-traps along permanent margins bordering strawberry fields on six organic and six conventional farms in eastern Denmark and compared the results of the survey with that of sampling site farming practice and field margin forage availability. The majority of bees sampled were polylectic solitary ground-nesting bees known to forage on species of the rose family. This indicates that these bee species are potential pollinators of strawberries, and the low number of specialized bees suggests that the bee community was affected by the simplified landscapes. Temporal trends in abundance, species richness, and body size of the bees, suggest that the functional diversity of pollinator assemblages available differed for early- and late-flowering strawberries. Fewer plants species and a lower plant cover were found in the margins of sprayed fields. Abundance and diversity of the wild bees were neither correlated with the use of herbicides and insecticides, nor with plant species richness or flowering plant cover.

This paper forecasts the spatial distribution of Danish husbandry production from 2009 until 2025, allowing an assessment of the potential future biogas production at a local level. The study builds on a unique time series data set (1999–2009) for the number of livestock units (including piglets, finishers, sows, dairy cattle and young stock) measured by 1 km 2 grid cells for the whole of Denmark. A Markov Chain Model (MCM) was applied to estimate transition probabilities for the future livestock intensity composition, based on state classes reflecting Danish agricultural legislation. The modelled transition probabilities were assumed to be stationary. This assumption was tested and good fit between the model and the data was found for all state classes, except for those farms which are in the largest state class. Regional differences in development trends were documented, supporting the argument of disaggregating data by georegion and livestock type. Throughout the period 2009–2020 slurry based biomass is expected to decrease by approx. 10% in Denmark. The largest changes are found in the Northern and Western parts of the country whereas the most frequent changes are expected to occur in the central parts of the country. The strategic objective of the model and its application within spatial assessment of the potential of biogas production is to form the basis for a location analysis for future biogas plants.

Cities require data on pedestrian movement to evaluate the use of public spaces. The authors propose a system using thermal cameras and Computer Vision (CV) combined with Geographical Information Systems (GIS) to track and assess pedestrian dynamics and behaviors in urban plazas. Thermal cameras operate independent of light and the technique is non-intrusive and preserves privacy. The approach extends the analysis to the GIS domain by capturing georeferenced tracks. The authors present a pilot study conducted in Copenhagen in 2013. The tracks retrieved by CV are compared to manually annotated ground truth tracks, and an example of pedestrian behavior is analyzed.

In the last decade, multiple GIS-based planning support systems have been developed in order to improve the basis for spatial planning. Recent research has focused on problems regarding a lack of utilisation or barriers to the use of advanced GIS and GIS-based planning support systems in planning applications. This paper discusses these research findings in the context of outdoor recreational planning by local governments in Denmark. According to a national survey of municipal planners, GIS-based planning support is widely used in Denmark, but more GIS is needed and is being requested for local outdoor recreation planning. However, considerable differences exist between the ways municipalities assess their need for and use of GIS planning support. These differences are explored in more detail using a factor analysis of planning variables and uses of GIS. Three situations are described: 1) extensive network-based collaborative planning associated with extensive GIS use; 2) experienced and older planners who are laggards regarding the use of advanced GIS-based planning support; and finally, 3) an envisioned need and demand for more GIS which are mainly realised through a GIS department in the municipality. These findings contribute to the development and implementation of spatial decision support systems and planning support systems in recreation planning. Recommendations are provided regarding the future of GIS use in local government planning.