BENEFITS OF OPEN SPACE IN METRO MELBOURNE

Urban open spaces in Melbourne provide valuable services to both locals and visitors. While there is general consensus on the importance of Melbourne’s open spaces, it is unclear what the economic value of the different types of open spaces is in monetary terms. Partnering with Mosaic Insights we are  engaged by the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (Vic) to explore this issue. We undertook this assessment by using non-market valuation methods to estimate the economic value of the different ecosystem services. We estimated the economic values through impacts on property prices, recreation, avoided health costs, carbon sequestration, and more.