Problemy i wyzwania stojące przed leśnictwem miejskim

Authorities managing urban forests or forests located within city boundaries face a number of problems related, on the one hand, to the strong processes of urbanisation and anthropopressure on forest areas and, on the other hand, to the lack of formal legal basis (laws, regulations, instructions) related directly to urban forestry and community forests. Forests in and around cities face many threats, such as those posed by unregulated urban development and lack of investment and management. While it is known that consistent investment in the creation, protection and restoration of urban forests can help create a heal thy environment, such forests are often appreciated more for their aesthetic value than their ecosystem services. Mayors, planners and other urban decision-makers are often unaware of the key economic, social and environmental benefits that urban forests can provide. The location of forests within the administrative boundaries of a large urban agglomeration generates a tremendous amount of tension and problems at the forest-human-infrastructure line, associated with extreme ways in which different social and professional groups approach the urban forest. The clash and intermingling of various activities related to forests result in gradual obliteration and depletion of the original functions of the forest, depending on the intensity of the impact of various activities, and, in extreme cases, the disappearance of the forest, which is replaced by, for example, roads, housing estates, car parks, etc. Urban forests are under strong human pressure and are subject to various types of damage, often not present in commercial forests. At the same time, the nature of urban forest use is subject to pressure from various interest groups formulating their expectations regarding local forest resources. These mostly concern aesthetic aspects and a sense of security and are often impossible to achieve when confronted with binding forest management rules. This leads to conflicts between different social groups. The population reacts in a negative way to, for example, clear-cutting or dead wood left in the forest. Therefore, one of the most important challenges for forest management of urbanized areas is to mitigate and resolve conflicts and to look for “compromise” in forest management activities. Other problems are as follows: high fragmentation of communal forests within urban areas, high diversity of land ownership preventing effective forest management, strong an thropopressure, especially in larger urban centres, littering in forests, destroying vegetation, lighting bonfires outside designated areas, poaching, lack of up-to-date forest management documentation, shortages of staff and adequate financial resources. The above-mentioned issues will be presented in the first part of the paper, which offers a closer look at the subsequent problems and challenges. The second part of the paper refers to the current level and capabilities of geo-information technologies, which enable the monitoring of land use changes at unprecedented temporal and spatial scales. This is particularly important in areas of large agglomerations, where the process of so-called ‘urban sprawl’ has a significant impact on the natural environment. Spatial information, combined with data collected during surveys and censuses by the Central Statistical Office, can tell us a lot about potential threats to forest areas, as well as about changes in society’s expectations concerning the role of selected forest complexes. There are also data resources created by users of social network sites and mobile phones, which provide information on the distribution of public activity in forest areas and allow areas of highest use to be identified. Finally, a selection of issues related to the potential of the aforementioned data to assess changes taking place around forest areas will be presented.