> He’s less enthusiastic about the presence of trees in cities. “They’re treated a bit like street furniture,” he laments. “The ecosystem is fragile. The city itself is very stressful for them. It’s hot and illuminated at night, when the trees also need to sleep. The ideal would be to create small ecosystems, as was done in Medellín in 2019, [when] more than 800,000 trees were planted. [The authorities] created a green corridor that allowed summer temperatures to drop by two to three degrees [Celsius].”
Trees are so essential to mental wellbeing. It’s sad to see cities turn previously green spaces into dull concrete land. Some of it may be, like this quote suggests, the particular approach used to tree and park management. But it also comes down to corruption and politics. In Seattle, long standing tree protection schemes and environmental codes are not bring enforced against developers building new housing, even though they are on the books and supposed to be applied equally to everyone. Builders of course are deeply involved in supporting local politicians. Meanwhile, the green canopy of tall older trees that defined the city is eroding every year, and what attracts people to this area is going away, in part due to the demands of the same people (for cheaper housing to enable them). I don’t know what the solution is, except for maybe big public works projects to replenish green spaces AND protect older growth across several decades. But that is what existing law (city codes) was supposed to do.
In Pakistan and India,plus other places, where once heavily treed citys are
now striped bare. There are truely apocoliptic smog events happening now.
The politicians hide untill there is a windy day, and take credit for having used the military to do "cloud seeding" and having caused rain somewhere else that it succeded in clearing the air.
It is so bad there now, that speculating about, at which point does the incredable
soot load in the air, actualy become flamable itself, as in fires/exposions in flour mills and saw mills, from the dust
reaching the critical air/fuel ratio for
combustion.
bad bad budaboom
> He’s less enthusiastic about the presence of trees in cities. “They’re treated a bit like street furniture,” he laments. “The ecosystem is fragile. The city itself is very stressful for them. It’s hot and illuminated at night, when the trees also need to sleep. The ideal would be to create small ecosystems, as was done in Medellín in 2019, [when] more than 800,000 trees were planted. [The authorities] created a green corridor that allowed summer temperatures to drop by two to three degrees [Celsius].”
Trees are so essential to mental wellbeing. It’s sad to see cities turn previously green spaces into dull concrete land. Some of it may be, like this quote suggests, the particular approach used to tree and park management. But it also comes down to corruption and politics. In Seattle, long standing tree protection schemes and environmental codes are not bring enforced against developers building new housing, even though they are on the books and supposed to be applied equally to everyone. Builders of course are deeply involved in supporting local politicians. Meanwhile, the green canopy of tall older trees that defined the city is eroding every year, and what attracts people to this area is going away, in part due to the demands of the same people (for cheaper housing to enable them). I don’t know what the solution is, except for maybe big public works projects to replenish green spaces AND protect older growth across several decades. But that is what existing law (city codes) was supposed to do.
In Pakistan and India,plus other places, where once heavily treed citys are now striped bare. There are truely apocoliptic smog events happening now. The politicians hide untill there is a windy day, and take credit for having used the military to do "cloud seeding" and having caused rain somewhere else that it succeded in clearing the air. It is so bad there now, that speculating about, at which point does the incredable soot load in the air, actualy become flamable itself, as in fires/exposions in flour mills and saw mills, from the dust reaching the critical air/fuel ratio for combustion. bad bad budaboom