Speaking of the way people are trained to think about the environment, the N&R’s Jason Hardin says —gasp—- Greensboro is losing its natural canopy:
In a recent 16-year stretch, the tree canopy in and around Greensboro shrank by nearly a fifth as houses, roads, shopping centers, ice storms, disease, insects and other threats decimated the urban forest that graces the Piedmont.
The effects of the degreening of Greensboro are broad and long-lasting.
With fewer trees, cities become hotter as they soak up the summer heat. Water flows more quickly into streams and rivers and picks up more pollutants on the way. Less carbon dioxide, a main contributor to global warming, is absorbed.
Are there fewer trees today than there were 16 years ago? Sure. It’s called development, something the N&R cheerleads for almost every day in its dead-tree editions, as long as it’s done the way the government says it should be done, that is.
But look out over Greensboro from the top of the Jefferson-Pilot building, the ninth floor of the UNCG library, or even the top of the Bellemeade parking deck and all you see for miles is green. Green, green, green.
