Urban Green Space Management for a Garden Nation
Lee Boon Thong
Nilai University, Malaysia
Thailand Many aspiring countries visualise a Garden Nation status in their march towards modernization and economic development. Malaysia has a vision of achieving "Garden Nation" status by the year 2020 to complement the economic transformation strategy to that of a developed nation, a strategy which has dramatically hastened the process of urbanisation. This calls for a meaningful strategic conservation and sustainable management of existing urban green space including measures to further enhance such areas. However, this paper submits for the need for proactive governance measures, not limited to conservation and sustainability, but including urban green space management in developing recreation, nature appreciation and environmental education programmes for parks and urban green space. Urban green space management poses substantial challenges especially in the Malaysian context of differentiating demands of the diverse population attributes such as ethnicity, culture, religion, and literacy levels. A conceptual framework for urban green space management that encapsulates these pluralities is postulated for discussion.
Incidents of the Conflict over Urban Green Space: Cases from Northeastern Thailand
Monsicha Bejrananda
Khon Kaen University
Northeastern Thailand has immense green open space ranging from relatively natural landscapes to such built environments as urban park. Recently, the rapid urbanization in the region not only change its rural landscape, but also increase the impact of development on urban ecology as well as disputes over urban space. Many incidents of conflict over urban space have obviously taken place in public land, the "urban green space." This lecture is about case studies from different cities in northeastern region of Thailand. They are an overview of the conflict over urban green spaces, how the public can play a vital role in protecting and managing the natural green space from the offensive development. They are evidences of how urgently the local government and the public need to change the way they look at urban green space. In addition, the challenges of development driven by economic pressure to the environmental needs in protection and preservation of natural spaces have inquired the need to redefine and re-examine the role and function of green open space in urban context.
June 24, 2015