Writing Workshop 5

🌳 Cities Fight the Heat — Global Teen Magazine

On a hot summer afternoon, the centre of a big city can be several degrees hotter than the countryside around it. Scientists call this the “urban heat island” effect. Roads, roofs and car parks are made of materials such as concrete and asphalt, which absorb the sun’s heat during the day and release it slowly at night. Cars and air conditioners add even more heat. As heatwaves become more common, this is becoming a serious health problem, especially for older people and young children.
Medellín, in Colombia, is a city of about two and a half million people in a warm mountain valley. For years, its busy roads had very few trees, and temperatures in the centre were rising. In 2016, the city government decided to try something different. Instead of building more air-conditioned buildings, it started to plant.
Over the next few years, the city created around thirty “green corridors”: lines of trees, bushes and plants along roads and rivers, connecting parks across the city. Many of the gardeners were people from poor neighbourhoods, who were trained for the job and given work. By 2019, the corridors had helped to bring temperatures in some areas down by about two degrees. They also clean the air and give birds and insects a place to live.
Medellín is not alone. In Paris, many school playgrounds used to be covered in grey asphalt. Since 2018, the city has been turning them into “oasis” playgrounds, with trees, plants, water fountains and surfaces that stay cooler in the sun. On very hot days, some of them are opened to local people as cool places to rest.
Not every idea needs a big budget. Painting roofs white, planting a single tree in a schoolyard or putting plants on a balcony all help a little. Experts say that the cities of the future will need more shade, more water and more green space. As an old saying goes, the best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago. The second-best time is today.