California's Urban Tree Canopy
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This interactive mapping tool shows California's urban tree canopy and how it has changed over time. A tree’s canopy cover—its leaves, branches, and stems that provide coverage of the ground when viewed from above—is a driving force behind numerous environmental, social, and economic services. The mapping tool overlays the tree canopy layer with other information, including census data, urban heat severity, and the extent of the wildland urban interface and intermix. Learn more about these layers at the complete viewer layer list. These layers provide context to help us understand differences in tree canopy across communities.
Communities plant trees for numerous reasons, including reducing summer peak temperatures, improving air quality, reducing stormwater run-off, enhancing property values, providing wildlife habitat, growing local food, and enriching neighborhood beautification.
Understanding the extent and location of existing tree canopy and how it has changed over time can help a community design and implement sound management practices to maximize those services through:
- Prioritizing tree planting locations in areas that have extreme heat
- Managing pest and disease threats to trees and addressing forest changes over time
- Planting trees that will not conflict with zoning or infrastructure, like roads or utilities
- Protecting existing tree canopy to ensure it continues to offer community-wide benefits
- Establishing urban forestry master plans that use baseline data to understand the current health of a community’s urban forest and set long-term tree canopy targets
- Identifying which tree species and planting locations that protect homes in our wildland urban interface from natural disaster
While the analysis of the canopy data is still ongoing, it is already providing insights about California’s urban forests. For instance, California's urban tree canopy covers 14.5 % of the state's urban areas. This represents an overall decrease by two percent since 2018, but is not a uniform loss across the state. From 2018-2022, we have generally experienced a net gain in tree canopy in the areas of Sacramento and surrounding Central Valley, San Diego and Imperial Counties, and large parts of Los Angeles and Inland Empire. Conversely, we have experienced a general net loss of tree canopy in the San Francisco Bay area, North Coast, Eastern Riverside County, Southern San Joaquin Valley and Redding.
Credits
The tree canopy layer was created by EarthDefine and Dewberry, under contract with the USDA Forest Service, California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CALFIRE), and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.