KTR announces Green Space Index

Municipal administration and urban development minister K.T. Rama Rao initiated Green Space Index (UGI) for urban local bodies (ULBs). The government will hold a competition pertaining to municipalities and municipal corporations and would give rankings based on the spread of green cover.

The UGI is a measure of the total green space in a city or town. The urban and regional development plans, formulation and implementation guidelines (URDPFI) issued by the Union urban affairs recommends a minimum of 10-12 sq.km of open spaces (recreational, parks, forests) per person.

The World Health Organisation (WHO) mandates a minimum of 9 sq. km of green space and recommends 50 sq. km if possible. A means to measure urban green spaces is required to ascertain the overall quality of life in the city and also to monitor the progress of local bodies in increasing the greenery.

Rama Rao said GUI is the best method to measure greenery and monitoring tree plantation drives such as Haritha Haram by geotagging each tree and park by physically surveying the entire ULB, capturing photos or videos. However, he said, this method is time

consuming and expensive.

“Remote sensing techniques offer alternative ways to measure green spaces, albeit with slightly lesser accuracy, which will be enough to monitor total green area in a given city. Using 360 Degrees Street View Video, which gives insights into the size, proportion, distribution, and health of green space in urban areas along with remote sensing techniques can be the most accurate option, the minister said.

The UGI is endeavoured to achieve 60 per cent green cover for all 141 ULBs and its main objectives are to promote green cover by rankings and giving awards to ULB, quantitative measure of green space area by GIS, encourage aesthetic landscape, symmetry in plantation, promoting innovations in ULBs, to improve overall living and experiential quality of the city and an analysis on native trees or suitable trees for the city.