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Urban landscapes homogenize our world at global scales, contributing to “extinction of experience”, a progressive decline in human interactions with native greenspace that can disconnect people from the services it provides. College age adults report feeling disconnected from nature more than other demographics, making universities a logical place to explore interventions intended to restore a connection with nature. This study surveyed 1088 students and staff across four university campus communities in Southern California, USA and used multicriteria decision analysis to explore their landscape preferences and the implications of those preferences for combatting extinction of experience. Our results suggest that perspectives of, and preferences for, different greenspace forms vary significantly (i.e., they are not perceived as substitutable). Support for native ecosystems, particularly coastal sage scrub (top ranked landscape) was generally high, suggesting that disaffection with wild nature is not particularly widespread. Programs for replacing turf grass lawns (lowest ranked landscape) with native plants were also well supported, but support for stormwater bioswales was more moderate (and variable). This may reflect their relative newness, both on university campuses and in urban spaces more generally. Not all members of campus communities preferred the same landscapes; preferences differed with degree of pro-environmentalism and university status (undergraduate student, graduate student, staff). Even so, all respondents exhibited landscape preferences consistent with at least one approach for combatting extinction of experience, suggesting that ecologists, engineers and urban planners have a viable set of generalizable tools for reconnecting people with nature. 

Saturated hydraulic conductivity (Ksat) is a key performance variable in nature-based solutions for managing stormwater such as bioretention. Ksat is well understood from a soils perspective, but not an ecological one, despite growing recognition that plant traits and soil characteristics influence one-another and may co-regulate Ksat. There are myriad plant traits that potentially influence Ksat, which makes it difficult to know where attention should be focused to inform hydrologic design. We address this knowledge gap by 1) evaluating adaptive strategy theory as an overarching framework for characterizing plant effects on Ksat, assessing fifteen bioretention systems across three U.S. states and 2), exploring the implications of this theory for spatial and temporal patterns in plant effects on Ksat driven by regional variability in planting guidance and trajectories of plant succession. Our results illustrate that adaptive strategy significantly influences Ksat, with ruderal plants tending to decrease it and stress tolerant or competitive/stress tolerant plants increasing it. These relationships are indirect, reflecting the impact of adaptive strategy on root traits and soil organic matter, which influence Ksat directly. When these relationships are evaluated in the context of established planting guidance, we find that plants recommended in arid climates tend to increase Ksat relative to bare filter media whereas plants in humid climates do not. Small biases in planting preferences can dramatically change these outcomes. For instance, established vegetation in our bioretention sites was more competitive/stress tolerant than expected, significantly increasing Ksat. We also find that plant effects on Ksat are likely to vary in response to ruderal recruitment as bioretention systems age, reducing Ksat up to 15 %. Collectively, these results illustrate that plants play an important role in bioretention hydrology, and warrant consideration during hydrologic design. They also suggest that adaptive strategy theory is a promising design tool, providing useful insights into plant effects on Ksat, both geographically and over time.