Posts tagged with 'urban trees'
I’ve watched in horror as Europe burns. Ferocious wildfires have swept through Spain, France and now Greece, scorching towns and forests and spewing toxic smoke. Hundreds of thousands of people have fled their homes. Many will have little left to return to. European ...
On a hot summer afternoon, the difference between one city block and the next can feel like a different world. On one street, the sun beats down from above while the pavement radiates heat from below. Just around the corner, ...
Over the next few decades, Rwanda is positioned to become one of the most competitive investment destinations in East Africa. National targets, such as achieving upper middle-income status by 2035 and high-income status by 2050 (Vision 2050)1, signal the government’s ...
When the weather heats up in Belo Horizonte, residents of Morro do Papagaio get creative. “A lot of people put their blankets in the refrigerator,” said Amanda Lima, a 24-year-old university student, activist and resident of the south-central region of ...
Early on a weekday morning in Atlanta, a familiar choreography unfolds along a landscaped path: High school students stream north to class; middle schoolers head south, backpacks bouncing as they bike; electric scooters zip past joggers and dog walkers, while ...
On most mornings, Cati Ochoa walks the green corridor along the Zamora River near her home in Loja, Ecuador, before starting work. The moment she steps beneath the trees, she feels her shoulders drop. “Green areas give us peace,” she said. ...
An ambitious reforestation program in Dire Dawa’s watershed is helping to restore hundreds of hectares of farmland and reduce flood risk, while providing 7,000 new jobs and economic opportunities, especially for women and young adults. Dire Dawa, Ethiopia, is known ...
Which neighborhoods are suffering the most from rising urban heat? Where is flooding the biggest challenge? What other cities around the world are struggling with air pollution, and what can we learn from those that have improved the quality of ...
Nestled in the Andes, Bogotá’s mountainous landscape traps air pollutants, sometimes cloaking the Colombian capital in a dusty smog. The consequences have been severe. The city’s poor air quality resulted in an estimated 2,300 excess deaths in 2019. In 2023, ...
In a city, a grassy park might be a place to stretch out with a book, an asphalt road your route to work, a building wall a canvas for a mural. But beyond their familiar roles, each of these surfaces ...
By midday in Mathare, a densely populated informal settlement in Nairobi, Kenya, the sun beats down on the tight rows of wooden stalls and corrugated metal rooftops. At an elevation of 5,889 feet (1,795 meters), Nairobi has long been known ...
In January 2024, the Central Business District of Cape Town, South Africa, endured a historically brutal day of heat: temperatures climbed to 44 degrees C – the highest ever measured in the city. But on that same day, people in other parts ...
Europe is the world’s fastest warming continent, which is severely impacting cities and leading to tens of thousands of deaths, rising hospitalizations, school closures and people adjusting their lives to avoid inhospitable outdoor conditions. The oppressive heat is being felt across the ...
Alexandra Township is a 20-square-block enclave in the heart of Johannesburg, South Africa’s northern suburbs. Established in 1902, the township was built to house 750,000 residents. Today, it is home to more than 1.2 million. Despite efforts to increase waste ...
Over the past two decades, Rwanda – the land of a thousand hills – has made remarkable strides: poverty has significantly declined and quality of life has improved. The service, industrial and agricultural sectors have flourished. Even in the aftermath ...
