Dallas will plant hundreds of trees in city parks this spring

Dallas will plant hundreds of trees in city parks this spring
Dallas will plant hundreds of trees in city parks this spring

The Dallas Park and Recreation Department plans to plant 800-1,000 young trees in city-owned parks by mid-April.

The initiative is part of the Branch Out Dallas program, which was started in 2018 to reduce the heat island effect and increase the overall tree canopy in Dallas. Heat islands are urbanized areas that experience higher temperatures than outside areas due to structures such as buildings and roads that absorb and emit the sun’s heat more than natural landscapes would, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

Dallas City Forester Chris McMaster said the minimum requirement for the annual program is to plant at least 600 trees over the course of 12 tree planting events. Since its inception, the program has exceeded that goal every year, even during the COVID-19 pandemic, he said.

“We were one of the few volunteer events you could go to and get out of the house and do something good,” McMaster said.

The tree-planting events are voluntary, but city staff are responsible for digging the holes for the trees and installing irrigation systems, McMaster said. The city partners with the Texas Trees Foundation, which coordinates volunteers and funds 50% of the budget required to water the new trees each year.

About 95% of the trees planted are native species with exceptions, such as pollinator-friendly trees, McMaster said. Each tree is considered 30 gallons, meaning they have a minimum trunk diameter of 2.5 inches and stand approximately 8 feet tall before planting.

Parking spaces are selected based on several criteria, including canopy coverage, availability of open spaces and equity. To ensure even distribution across the city, two parks are selected from each of the city’s six maintenance districts, McMaster said.

See also  Dallas-Chicago-area lenders band together as they face a "crippled" mortgage market

The upcoming volunteer tree planting events are as follows:

Typically, each park is selected for a tree-planting event only once, rather than repeating any of the city’s 400 parks. Dallas Tree Planting Coordinator Eric Wettengel said this decision is intended to ensure that the trees planted around the city are not all the same age.

“It’s important not to have all your trees at the exact same age, because then 40-50 years later the trees will start to fail all at once,” Wettengel said.

Although it has a positive environmental impact, planting trees around the city also brings various benefits to society. Public green spaces can provide space for physical activity and social interaction while helping to curb mental illnesses, such as depression, according to a study published in the National Library of Medicine.

“For us to enrich and grow our green space that is accessible to residents is invaluable,” McMaster said.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *