Review of Researches on Impacts of Climate Change on Urban Vegetation

The growth of urban plants is significantly affected by climate change, which accordingly limits the stable function of ecosystem services. A profound understanding of the impact of climate change on urban plants is critically important to improve the ecological adaptability of urban vegetation to climate change, maintain urban ecosystem stability and ensure landscape sustainability. This research gives a comprehensive interpretation about the impact of climate change on urban vegetation based on a systematic review and systematic summary of relevant domestic and foreign academic publications, aiming to draw more attention of our colleagues in landscape architecture to this field. The current studies show that global climate change has imposed a significant influence on the growth conditions, species composition, phenology characteristics, landscape effects and ecological functions of urban vegetation. The multiple effects include both positive and negative ones. The positive effects include the extension of the plant growth season, while the negative effects are as follows: global warming accelerating the aging of urban plants, extreme climate events aggravating physiological stresses to plant growth, decrease of climatically-suitable habitats for urban plants leading to tree species diversity decline and increased risk in biological invasion, climate-driven phenological variation changing interspecific relationship in community and the seasonal aspect of urban vegetation, and phenological fluctuation increasing the uncertainty of time arrangement in flower festival organization and control of phenology-driven seasonal diseases. The negative effects are more overwhelming than the positive ones, indicating that climate change brings far greater challenges to urban vegetation than opportunities. However, domestic research in this field is still insufficient, and more attention in the future is deserved.