Social heterogeneity, local capacity, and urban parks: Evidence from US cities

This paper analyzes the provision of urban parks and recreational spaces, focusing on public funding efforts in metropolitan cities. Using cities as units of analysis and fifteen years of data, we examine their public funding efforts for parks and recreational spaces, evaluating the reliability of the findings across alternative modeling specifications. Social and institutional characteristics are explored as for explanations of public funding efforts for parks and recreational spaces. The main finding is that significantly different levels of parks and recreation spending are prevalent across American cities. Additional findings are that social and institutional conditions affect the public funding of parks and recreation programs, based on a pooled spatial analysis of cities. While its primary contribution is to research on disparities in urban parks and recreational spaces, the paper also integrates social and institutional literatures to identify factors influencing the allocation of public funds to those spaces in metropolitan areas. •Development of local capacity allows urban communities to mitigate resource disparities in parks and recreational spaces.•Municipal incorporation provides unincorporated communities with self-governing capacity to support parks and recreation.•Urban parks can be supported by alternative institutional arrangements like regional districts and nonprofit participation.