When you think of trees, you might picture vast wooded forests in more rural settings. But many don’t realize how important trees are to urban communities and ecosystems as well. That’s why David Nowak, a researcher for the Forest Service, has teamed up with private industry and non-governmental organizations to create an innovative tool called iTree to help community leaders and the public understand the impact of trees in their community.
With the data entered into i-Tree, a web-based tool, communities can be better educated on the health of the trees in their area, the benefits of them and how they could improve their urban forest structure. iTree has been used in over 100 countries and has had about 12,000 users since 2006, and has helped those communities learn more about the positive impact of trees in their cities. The city of Pittsburgh used iTree to calculate that city trees provided a monetary benefit three times greater that the annual cost of upkeep, leading the city to develop a plan for working on growing its tree canopy.
“We tend to focus on cars and roads and development, but in the background is always nature that also affects people’s lives,” said Nowak.
>>Read more about Nowak’s work with iTree here.
