Objective Most of the existing park green spaces in Chengdu City are facing problems such as lack of care and serious wilderness, and the ability to gain public awareness of urban wilderness landscape is of great significance for the transformation of such green spaces. However, scholars at home and abroad have conducted very few empirical studies on urban wilderness landscape, and there is a serious lack of basic surveys on the distribution, use, and public preferences thereof. Therefore, this research constructs a diversified value assessment system for urban wilderness landscape on the basis of previous researches on the value of urban wilderness landscape purely at the theoretical level, with a view to providing suggestions and strategies for transformation of parks presenting a tendency of wildness, and providing theoretical references for the formulation of urban wilderness protection policies through field research, thus guiding the transformation and renewal of wilderness parks in Chengdu City.

Method Firstly, this research extracts the indicators for evaluating the value of urban wilderness landscape from a large amount of existing literature, and adopts the expert consultation method to construct an urban wilderness value assessment indicator system applicable to the characteristics of Chengdu City itself. Secondly, the research adopts the method of public participation geographic information system (PPGIS) , in combination with questionnaires, rating scales, and semi-structured interviews, interview 500 citizens in Qinglong Lake Wetland Park in Chengdu, and finally collects a total of 480 pieces of valid data, including data on value cognition and spatial positioning of the interviewees. Subsequently, the research statistically analyzes the data collected using Excel, and tests data reliability and validity, as well as the correlation between demographic characteristics variables and factors influencing the values of urban wilderness landscape with SPSS 26.0 software. Finally, the research draws visual drawings with ArcGIS 10.8 software, conducts area measurement with AutoCAD 2020 software, and analyzes the spatial distribution characteristics of the values of urban wilderness landscape and the correlations thereof with different levels of wilderness landscape based on the results.

Results 1) In terms of public cognition, the public’s understanding and overall cognition of the concept of urban wilderness (landscape) is quite poor. Demographic variables are correlated with the public cognition of the values of urban wilderness landscape, and there are differences in the cognition of different values among different social groups. 2) From the perspective of spatial distribution, the five values of urban wilderness landscape present different spatial distribution characteristics, and the distribution of cognition degree is relatively decentralized. The concentrated area is dominated by natural elements such as water bodies, hillsides, and plants. Artificial elements such as stations, seats, roads and street lights are also important factors influencing public cognition. 3) In terms of spatial proportion, different grades of wilderness also have a certain influence on public cognition, and the public’s cognition of the quality grades of urban wilderness is dominated by medium quality and low quality, and they believe that the landscape value of medium-quality wilderness is the highest, while that of high-quality wilderness is the lowest. This is different from the conclusion of judging the values of urban wilderness landscape solely from an ecological perspective or a humanistic perspective, and the perspective of this research provides a more comprehensive overview of the values of urban wilderness landscape based on the diversified value evaluation systems mentioned above.

Conclusions The public’s cognition of the values of urban wilderness landscape is revealed in terms of conceptual understanding, cognitive rating, and spatial distribution. Subsequent research should focus on improving the degree of understanding, balancing the proportion of natural and artificial elements, preserving or creating wilderness landscape of different qualities, and formulating different transformation strategies for different audiences, in order to better guide the transformation and renewal of the wilderness parks in Chengdu City.