One afternoon, as I was driving through Salt Lake City, I noticed something striking.
On the city's east side, mature trees line almost every street. But when I crossed over to the west side, I passed long stretches of pavement and warehouses with very little arboreal shade. Urban foresters call these areas “tree canopy deserts.”
The west side of Salt Lake City has about half the tree canopy of the east side. And urban planners know that that difference matters.
Why? Because urban trees are much more than scenery. They cool neighborhoods, filter pollutants from the air, reduce stormwater flooding and improve our mental health. Most important to me, they foster closer relationships between people and trees.
Urban foresters have a name for their efforts to make sure that people from all parts of the city can benefit from trees: tree equity.
It’s the idea that everyone — regardless of where they live, how much they earn or their ethnic or national background — deserves the benefits of a healthy tree canopy.
I'm happy that Salt Lake City is working to close the tree equity gap. An Urban Forestry Division initiative will plant 1,000 trees on the west side each year. Projects like that are bringing green corridors to neighborhoods that have long had too few trees.
So, when trees are planted where they're needed most, they don't just change a street. They change the health, comfort and future of an entire community.
You can read KUER's reporting on the Urban Forest Action Plan here.
