Quite frankly, trees inside cities are decorative. If you truly care about ecology and the ecosystem, you look at the forestry on a national or regional level. Theoretically, having the densest and hence the smallest cities possibles would be the best for the overall ecosystem. When I see a park in a city I am thinking “they force the city to grow its radius by that much”.
I’d rather have a very dense urban seed surrounded by natural reserves than a chill cityscape with a few scattered parks that are not big enough to sustain a full ecosystem.
Second, “merely decorative” isn’t even true. Trees lower both surface and air temperature in cities in a meaningful way (on the order of a couple of degrees on a well-treed street – that can be the difference between “ah, it’s a nice day for a walk” and “holy crap it’s hot out”.
Quite frankly, trees inside cities are decorative. If you truly care about ecology and the ecosystem, you look at the forestry on a national or regional level. Theoretically, having the densest and hence the smallest cities possibles would be the best for the overall ecosystem. When I see a park in a city I am thinking “they force the city to grow its radius by that much”.
I’d rather have a very dense urban seed surrounded by natural reserves than a chill cityscape with a few scattered parks that are not big enough to sustain a full ecosystem.
First of all, “merely decorative” has a big impact on our physiological and psychological well-being; urban greening appears to be able to improve things from respiratory difficulties to stress, anxiety and depression .
Second, “merely decorative” isn’t even true. Trees lower both surface and air temperature in cities in a meaningful way (on the order of a couple of degrees on a well-treed street – that can be the difference between “ah, it’s a nice day for a walk” and “holy crap it’s hot out”.