The Second Congress of the Society for Urban Ecology was held in Shanghai China on July 8-10,2016. The theme of the congress is "Challenges of Urban Ecology in the Context of Rapid Urbanization and Global Environmental Change ". There are 16 sessions in the congress focusing on urbanization dynamics, urban sustainability, urban biodiversity assessment, and urban ecology education etc. Urban green space is one of the major topics during the congress, which discussed relationship between urban green space and biodiversity, the regulating and cultural services provided by urban green space, as well as the relationship between urban green space and compact city. In order to facilitate further discussions in urban green space studies, we summarized presentations on urban green spaces during the congress. These presentations and discussions shed light on future directions of urban green space studies: 1) assessing public education and awareness rising programs on ecosystem services provided by urban green space; 2) conducting site-level studies on green space design, management and assessment; and 3) examining the multi-functions of urban green space.