Urban Forestry and Green Infrastructure

NACD's mission is to serve conservation districts by providing national leadership and a unified voice for natural resource conservation.

As communities grow, trees and open spaces are cleared to make way for buildings, roads, parking lots and utilities—the gray infrastructure. These impervious surfaces have increased by 20 percent in urban areas in the past two decades, according to American Forests’ studies.

Seedlings grown by Seward, Alaska high school students to reforest the Kenai Peninsula

-Photo Courtesy Kenai Soil and Water Conservation District

Investments in ‘green infrastructure’ are just as essential to the health and economic viability of communities. Trees and other elements of the green infrastructure—a network of waterways, wetlands, woodlands, other natural areas—are the nation’s natural life support system. In urban settings, trees mitigate temperature extremes, air pollution and flooding. Without them, communities spend millions of dollars in heating, cooling and stormwater management costs while the quality of air, soil and waterways declines.

An Introduction to Urban and Community Forestry – briefing paper
An Introduction to Green Infrastructure – briefing paper
District Involvement in Urban Forestry and Green Infrastructure – briefing paper
Special Report: The Challenge of Urban Forestry (.pdf file)
Urban Forestry and Green Infrastructure Resource Links