Keywords: Trees, residential streets, perceived effects, affective response, relevance, perception, urban green,
well-being. Best-Worst method
Understanding how urban residents perceive the effects of trees in residential streets is crucial in
developing appropriate strategies to improve the appreciation of trees. This study explored residents’
perception of the perceived direct effects of trees in residential streets through a questionnaire survey
based on the best–worst scaling (BWS) method. The results demonstrated that the balance between
the beneficial effects and the detrimental effects of trees lean towards the positive side. The most
important effects were perceived as most positive while the more negative effects were ranked on an
average importance level. This indicates that existing trees should be kept and new trees should be
implemented in residential streets. The survey also found similarities and differences between different
social groups. Analysing the influence of social demographic, concluded that there were more
differences found between the social characteristics groups’ average affective response than between their
level of importance scores. Whitin the age groups the most significant differences were found by both the
affective response scores and the level of importance scores. During the execution of the survey another
feature arose, the storm Eunice, and showed that an extreme weather event can influence residents’
assessment. A strategy was made to increase the appreciation of trees in streets. This increased
appreciation of trees improves the well-being of residents that are threatened due to the changing climate
and the densification of cities.
Overall, the study shows that the focus need to switch to retain the important positive effect of trees
instead of the drawback of trees that are relatively less important. With this insight more valuable urban
green places can be made and maintained in order to optimizing the appreciation of trees in residential
streets, and so optimizes the well-being of residents.