Words by Smiley Team
The green spaces in New York city are important for recreation and leisure, but also crucial in helping our country tackle climate change.
So it’s encouraging that five of the city’s borough presidents have joined forces to give the mayor a new idea to go even further: plant one million more trees in the next 10 years.
They also called on the mayor to honor a pledge he made to allocate 1% of the city’s budget to funding the Parks Department. “It seems like trees are universally liked,” said Antonio Reynoso, one of the borough presidents.
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It’s been reported that planting one million trees would increase the canopy of the city to 30% – right now, it sits at around 22%.
The “Million More Trees” project isn’t new – in 2015, one million trees were planted on streets and parks across all five boroughs. At the time, they encouraged people to plant trees on their own, or attend volunteer tree planting events. Others were given the option to adopt a tree or attend events about the benefits of them.
Overall, New York has around seven million trees. They absorb carbon dioxide, as well as providing shade for the public in the summer – this is advantageous for the city, as they lose “hundreds” of residents a year due to extreme heat.
An average of 10 New Yorkers die of heat stress and approximately 100 die due to chronic conditions that have been worsened by the heat on extreme heat event days.
If the pledge goes ahead, Million More Trees hopes to finish the planting by 2035.
GET INVOLVED: Want to find out how the last Million Trees initiative went down? Learn more at milliontreesnyc.org.
VOLUNTEER: One Tree Planted is a nonprofit in the US that is deidcated to supporting tree growth. Find out more.
DONATE: Join Team Trees and donate as little as $1 to help them on their mission.
