Correlations among AHP-based scenic beauty estimation and water quality indicators of typical urban constructed WQT wetland park landscaping

Abstract

Water environments of urban constructed water quality treatment (WQT) wetland waterscapes are strongly related to water quality, whereas scenic beauty values help achieve better aquatic environments. However, correlations between several water quality indicators (WQIs) and scenic beauty indexes (SBIs) have not been thoroughly revealed in the existing studies. In this research, an analytic hierarchy process (AHP)-based on scenic beauty estimation (SBE) per site in two WQT wetlands has been developed. The weights of indicators were determined by the AHP voting, which includes three main criteria, i.e., conditions of vegetation, physical geographical conditions, and human geographical conditions. SBIs are voted and calculated from the professional group and the unprofessional group. WQIs of typical pollutants (i.e., dissolved oxygen (DO), CODCr, NH3-N, pH, and total phosphorus) were sampled in situ simultaneously. Inter-relationships among SBIs and WQIs are indicated by correlative analysis and a regression model, which highlights that DO increase, CODCr removal, and NH3-N removal can explain 68.8% of changes in the SBI. Accordingly, applications for WQT wetland eco-engineered landscaping (EEL) were suggested to be conducted on quantitative estimations in three aspects, i.e., following strategies of EEL, improving WQT techniques, and applying the attention restoration theory. With deeper comprehension of SBIs, practical design, management, and maintenance of WQT wetlands will be optimised.