Because of the environmental and social benefits associated with urban greening, many cities around the world are implementing strategies to increase tree canopy cover, including along residential streets. However, procedures for developing and implementing these strategies do not always factor in public preferences, which can limit public acceptance. This paper explores public preferences for different characteristics of street trees. Where past studies have relied on capturing perceptions of street trees using rating scales for relatively few attributes, we apply best-worst scaling, which is a type of choice experiment, to assess preferences for 16 different tree characteristics. As the method requires trade-offs from respondents, it results in a systematic ranking of the tree characteristics considered, which represent different ecosystem services, physical attributes, and management requirements. We find that capacity to support local biodiversity and drought tolerance are the two characteristics that are most preferred. We also find that having visual appeal, requiring little maintenance, and having native origins are viewed favourably. Tree characteristics seen as less important include the size and growth rate of a tree, along with whether it holds cultural significance. Better understanding preferences for tree characteristics presents an opportunity for environmental managers to integrate tree species with more widely accepted attributes into urban greening programs.

中文翻译：

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行道树特征的公众偏好：最佳-最差缩放实验


由于城市绿化具有环境和社会效益，世界各地的许多城市都在实施增加树冠覆盖率的策略，包括住宅街道沿线。然而，制定和实施这些策略的程序并不总是考虑公众偏好，这可能会限制公众的接受度。本文探讨了公众对行道树不同特征的偏好。过去的研究依赖于使用相对较少属性的评级量表来捕捉对行道树的看法，而我们应用最佳-最差缩放，这是一种选择实验，来评估对 16 种不同树木特征的偏好。由于该方法需要受访者进行权衡，因此可以对所考虑的树木特征进行系统排名，这些特征代表了不同的生态系统服务、物理属性和管理要求。我们发现，支持当地生物多样性的能力和耐旱性是最受欢迎的两个特征。我们还发现，具有视觉吸引力、几乎不需要维护和拥有原生起源的人受到好评。被认为不太重要的树木特征包括树木的大小和生长速度，以及它是否具有文化意义。更好地了解树木特征的偏好为环境管理人员提供了一个机会，可以将具有更广泛接受属性的树种纳入城市绿化计划。