| Urban parks and protected areas have a long history with modern parks emerging in the 1800s. Early focus was on providing for passive outdoor recreation in pleasant, natural surroundings, albeit ones often highly modified. Over time, the values of parks have broadened to include an array of environmental, social and economic goals. The purpose of this dissertation is to trace the history of thinking about parks and protected areas in urban planning, focusing on Toronto, Ontario as the main case study. Changes in ecosystem science, planning and other theory as reflected in official plans and other documents are explored and related to changes in park and protected area planning. Comparisons are made to other urban areas, Ottawa and Waterloo, Ontario, Chicago, Illinois and Portland, Oregon, to provide a broader context for this study.; Overall, there has been a distinct shift from thinking about urban parks focused on recreation and leisure to thinking about urban protected areas and goals such as biodiversity and ecosystem integrity or health. The literature, as well as examples from urban planning, shows a general progression through several key ideas or stages, including: setting aside early "pleasure ground" parks in the mid- to late 1800s; city beautiful plans incorporating parks in the early 1900s; growing environmental awareness in the 1930s, renewed interest in parks and greenbelts in the post-Second World War period; advent of metropolitan planning in the 1950s and 1960s; development of park and open space systems that gradually incorporated environmental goals in the 1970s; the development of protected area land use categories to complement the idea of park in the late 1970s and early 1980s; the incorporation of new planning goals such as sustainable development and biodiversity in the mid- to late 1990s; increased public participation and stewardship particularly in the second half of the 1990s, and the development of natural heritage system in the late 1990s and 2000s.; All of this illustrates a growing understanding of the value of planning for environmental features and functions in urban areas and the important role of protected areas in doing so. Over time, urban planning has increasingly incorporated understandings from the ecological sciences, such as landscape ecology and conservation biology, and understanding about the values of protected areas and methods to plan for them continue to evolve. Recent developments in Ontario, such as planning reforms, source water protection planning and the Golden Horseshoe Greenbelt are discussed in terms of influencing protected areas planning. The concept of "green infrastructure" is proposed as a potentially powerful way to rethink protected areas that would encompass their array of values and to move forward with urban planning that more fully incorporates protected areas. Future directions for research are outlined, notably more in-depth study of park and protected area planning in other urban areas; examining the evolving role of non-governmental organisations in park and protected area planning; the role of urban protected areas in planning for drinking water protection and watershed planning generally; the history of thinking about parks and protected areas from a social or political perspective; follow up studies on current and emerging initiatives such as the Golden Horseshoe Greenbelt and environmentally sensitive landscapes; and the concept of green infrastructure. All of this indicates the highly dynamic nature of this topic. Events are evolving quickly and will require ongoing monitoring and research. |
