Environmental and socio-ecological performance of greening at household and street level

Household- and street-level greening is a key strategy for enhancing urban resilience to climate change, yet gaps persist in understanding their environmental and socio-ecological performance. To address this gap, this study aims to identify the most common household and street-scale green infrastructure (GI) types in the UK, develop a structured scoring framework for evaluating their environmental and socio-ecological performance, and determine which configurations deliver the greatest multifunctional benefits. We surveyed 112 cities and towns in England and Wales, documenting a total of over 900 sites across front gardens, back gardens, and streets. Common types of greenery included grass, hedges, container plants, street trees, and low shrubs. A five-level scoring framework was developed to assess these configurations' environmental and socio-ecological performance across five impact dimensions: air quality, cooling, flood mitigation, biodiversity, and health and wellbeing. The framework was informed by 991 peer-reviewed studies (2015–2025), expert judgement, and remote visual assessments. The results reveal a clear performance gap between single-element and multi-element configurations. At the household level, combinations of hedges, grass, and trees scored highest in pollutant reduction, cooling, and surface water management. Adding container plants or vertical green screens further improved biodiversity and wellbeing, especially in front gardens. At the street level, the highest scores were associated with configurations that included street trees, roadside grass, hedges, and shrubs. Pocket gardens further enhanced socio-ecological performance through vegetation diversity and vertical layering. These findings underscore the role of plant diversity and spatial composition in maximising the multifunctional benefits of household and street-scale greenery and emphasise that collectively these provide the most benefit when planned as a multifunctional network of GI. The study offers a replicable, evidence-based reference to support DIY and community greening and supports equity and resilience in UK residential areas.