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Municipal Park Grounds and Microplastics Contamination
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Soil samples from a municipal park in São Paulo, Brazil, contained 1,401 microplastic items per kilogram — approaching the 2,393 items per kilogram found in the adjacent landfill — with polypropylene, PET, and polyethylene fragments and fibers present in degraded form. The findings establish that urban parks with high foot traffic represent significant and underappreciated terrestrial microplastic sources, with contamination levels comparable to designated waste disposal sites.
The presence of microplastics (MPs) in different terrestrial ecosystems has adverse effects on planet biota and even on humans in the long term. However, few studies evaluate areas with a high circulation of people, such as parks. This work aimed to carry out a comparative study between the municipal landfill and one park in Santo André (SP), Brazil, seeking to prove their presence and establish the types of plastics found in these environments, exploring the correlation between them. For that, different sites at the park were selected, and soil was collected from the surface and 20 cm depth. The samples were characterized by optical microscopy and Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, and MPs abundancy and the results were compared with landfill soil as standard. Results indicated the presence of microplastics in the park soil in different morphologies, such as fragments and fibers, and degradation characteristics. The FTIR indicated the presence of polypropylene, polyethylene terephthalate, and polyethylene, with an abundance of 1401 items kg−1 for the park and 2393 items kg−1 in the landfill, indicating that parks have high amounts of MPs in the soil, like landfills, being a source of contaminants with risk of toxicity. This work established a correlation between regions with a higher flow of people and, consequently, more significant maintenance and cleaning, with a lower frequency of microplastics, and regions with a lower flow of people, such as places with more vegetation, where the incorrect disposal of solid waste results in a higher frequency of microplastics with characteristics of degradation by weathering.
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Microplastics in Urban Environments: Sources, Pathways, and Distribution
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Researchers mapped the major sources and pathways of microplastic pollution in cities, finding that tire wear, laundry wastewater, landfills, and construction activity collectively make urban areas major generators of the microplastics that flow into surrounding air, water, and soil.
Influence of urban land use on the accumulation of microplastics in urban water bodies
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This study found that the way land is used in cities, like how much is covered by roads, buildings, or industry, affects how much microplastic pollution ends up in nearby water bodies. This matters because these tiny plastic particles can travel through waterways into the food we eat and the water we drink, so understanding their sources in cities could help guide better urban planning to reduce our exposure to them.
Sources and Fate of Microplastics in Urban Systems
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Urban environments generate microplastics through road runoff, stormwater drainage, and inadequate waste management, releasing particles directly into local waterways at high concentrations. Cities are both major sources and exposure zones for microplastics, making urban infrastructure improvements a priority for reducing human contact with contaminated water and air.
Sources and Fate of Microplastics in Urban Systems
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Researchers examined how microplastics enter and move through urban environments, tracing sources from personal care products, synthetic clothing, and infrastructure degradation to eventual fate in waterways — as global plastic production exceeds 380 million metric tons annually, cities are both major generators and transport corridors for microplastic pollution.
Spatial Distribution and Characterization of Microplastics in the State Parks’ Water Bodies within A Large-scale Watershed in the U.S.A.
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A study of seven Virginia State Parks within the James River Watershed found microplastic concentrations ranging from 0 to 26.5 particles per liter, with higher concentrations in mainstream water bodies and a significant positive correlation with overnight tourist activity. The findings show that even protected natural areas are not shielded from microplastic pollution, and human visitation is a meaningful driver of contamination in freshwater ecosystems.
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