Benefits of Trees

Trees do more than beau­ti­fy our streets; they pro­vide great eco­nom­ic ben­e­fits, too! Here are a few ways trees help our econ­o­my every day:

• Trees low­er util­i­ty bills! Ever­green trees help to low­er ener­gy bills in the win­ter by block­ing cold wind. In the sum­mer, the cool­ing effect of a healthy tree is equiv­a­lent to 10 room-size air con­di­tion­ers oper­at­ing 20 hours/day.
• Shop­pers will trav­el fur­ther and longer to vis­it a busi­ness dis­trict with high qual­i­ty trees, and spend more time there once they arrive.
• In the Philadel­phia neigh­bor­hood of New Kens­ing­ton, new tree plant­i­ngs increased sur­round­ing hous­ing val­ues by approx­i­mate­ly 10%.
• In some sec­tors of the econ­o­my, such as tree care, there is a job for every trained work­er (evi­denced by such com­pa­nies strug­gling to find employees).
• Pitts­burgh’s street trees alone pro­vide $2.4 mil­lion worth of envi­ron­men­tal and aes­thet­ic ben­e­fits every year (see the Next City arti­cle here)!

(infor­ma­tion gath­ered from the Alliance for Com­mu­ni­ty Trees unless oth­er­wise noted)