2.2.1. Exposure: Availability and Proximity to Parks and Playgrounds in the Neighborhood

The availability and proximity to parks and playgrounds in the home neighborhood were generated with ArcGIS 10.2 software (ESRI Inc., Redlands, CA, USA). Different street-network buffers (i.e., 250, 500, 1000 and 1250 m) were defined to estimate accessible environmental features according to previous research in youth samples [27,29,30]. The street-network distance of 1250 m is considered as that from which the number of passive commuters exceeds the number of active commuter to school in Spanish urban children [30]. Active commuting involves active modes of transport such as walking or cycling, whereas passive commuting involves passive ones (e.g., car, motorbike or public transport). In the present study, we used this threshold distance to define the largest street-network buffer. The following variables were used in our analyses: park land area contained within or intersected by buffer, number of parks contained or intersected by buffer, street-network distance to the nearest park, number of playgrounds contained or intersected by buffer, and street-network distance to the nearest playground. Figure 1 shows an example of the location of parks and playgrounds in a participant’s neighborhood using a 250 m street-network buffer. The spatial distribution of park land use and the location of playgrounds were obtained from the OSM (Open Street Maps) service. Additionally, we used the General Urban Plan of the city of Valencia (https://www.valencia.es/dadesobertes/es/data/, accessed on 20 March 2020) to verify the data obtained from the OSM.

Example of the accessibility to parks and playgrounds in a participant’s neighborhood using a 250 m street-network buffer.