Fast Fact Library

Greening in and around schoolyards can improve academic achievement. A study of 450 public schools in Washington state showed positive relationships between school greenness and academic achievement in sixth graders...

Kuo, Ming, Samantha E Klein, Matthew HEM Browning, and Jaime Zaplatosch. “Greening for academic achievement: Prioritizing what to plant and where.” Landscape and Urban Planning 206 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1016/j.landurbplan.2020.103962.

A systematic review of research on the effectiveness of nature-based solutions for addressing climate impacts showed that that of 293 interventions, 59% reduced adverse climate impacts. Overall, the studies that...

Chausson, Alexandre, Beth Turner, Dan Seddon, Nicole Chabaneix, Cécile A. J. Girardin, Valerie Kapos, Isabel Key, Dilys Roe, Alison Smith, Stephen Woroniecki, and Nathalie Seddon. “Mapping the effectiveness of nature-based solutions for climate change adaptation.” Global Change Biology 26, 11 (2020): 6134-6155. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.15310.

Some plants are more effective than others mitigating air pollution with vegetated roadside buffers. Small, stiff, and complex leaves are generally more effective than larger, less rigid and less complex leaves...

Barwise, Yendle, and Prashant Kumar. “Designing vegetation barriers for urban air pollution abatement: a practical review for appropriate plant species selection”. npj Climate and Atmospheric Science 3, 12 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41612-020-0115-3

An analysis of satellite data for 14,000 cities and towns in the United States showed that areas within a 10-minute walk of a park can be up to 6° F cooler than areas further away from parks.

Trust for Public Land and MKThink. (2020). The Heat Is On: With temperatures rising and quality parks too few and far between, communities of color face a dangerous disparity. https://www.tpl.org/sites/default/files/The-Heat-is-on_A-Trust-for-Public-Land_special-report.pdf.

A cross-sectional study of almost 47,000 Australian residents showed that higher percentage of tree cover within one mile of their residence was associated with lower prevalence of diabetes, hypertension, and...

Thomas Astell-Burt, and Feng, Xiaoqi. “Urban green space, tree canopy and prevention of cardiometabolic diseases: a multilevel longitudinal study of 46,786 Australians.” International Journal of Epidemiology 49, Issue 3 (2020): 926–933. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyz239.