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A thread! @PlacesJournal published an article I wrote about the politics of shade in Los Angeles. Shade, as in, what’s under a tree, or a covered walkway, or created by an awning—basically, where you want to be on a hot day. It’s cooler there! 1/ placesjournal.org/article/shade-…
This is such a common sight in L.A.—a bus rider waiting in the tiny sliver of shade of a telephone pole. @sahrasulaiman has been documenting this phenomenon for years. There just isn’t enough shade on the street, and it's unfair and ridiculous. 2/ la.streetsblog.org/2012/07/12/des… 
The idea that there's not enough shade in L.A. probably sounds preposterous to a New Yorker, where skyscrapers cast long shadows on narrow roads, or to a Midwesterner who’s used to cloudy skies. L.A. is the Land of Sunshine. What is film, after all, but a screen for light? 3/
There are more than a hundred 80-degree days in L.A. every year. Unless you're near the beach, L.A.'s is a dry heat amplified by thousands of miles of asphalt, laid out for cars. Stand in that heat long enough, and you'll start to feel it. 4/
“It’s the sweat. You just feel nasty and unmotivated to work or do anything,” a busrider told @meghamama. “It kind of kills your day sometimes.” He was one of eight people squeezed in a shady alley between two buildings. 5/ scpr.org/news/2016/05/0…
Too much sun also causes heat stress. During a deadly heat wave in 2006, L.A. county hospitals took in 17,000 patients for heat strokes, kidney failure, heart attacks, and other more. Expect more of that when there’s constant 95-degree heat. 6/ latimes.com/local/californ…
Shade is a simple, effective way of staying cool in those conditions. Psychologically it is the determining factor in personal comfort. A tree, a poly tarp, an awning—whatever. Shade lowers asphalt temps by 40 degrees. And it’s greater on jungle gyms. 7/ sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
Historically, in L.A., bus shelters were built in wealthy neighborhoods, where there were fewer riders, and where revenue exceeded maintenance. Things are changing, but in poorer parts of the city, sidewalk infrastructure just won’t allow for it. 8/ journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.3141/17…
This is Tony's Barber Shop in Cypress Park. In 2015, the city took down this homemade bus shelter under a program to promote the “aesthetic value” of “tidy and attractive” neighborhoods. The councilman who sponsored it has less than 2 percent of the city’s bus ridership. 9/
L.A. also designs shade out of parks. In the '50s, Pershing Square was rebuilt without an urban forest, after businesses complained about drug users and cruisers. “Pedestrians will be walking through" the park, @latimes declared. “That is why parks are built.” 10
A new design for the park has a massive, block-length arbor called a “shade pergola.” But there aren’t any benches in the renderings, because shade creates public shelter, and L.A. has a very conflicted position on that. 11/ la.curbed.com/2019/4/25/1851…
Shade structures are a "very contested element in public space," the designer told me. The pergola is “very high and very wide, so it becomes like one big overall ceiling,” without places for people to “gather, group, and stay there, and see it as their little house.” 12/
What about street trees? Let’s get it out of the way now. L.A. loves palm trees—which “mock the very idea of shade,” as Victoria Dailey wrote in one of my all-time favorite essays for @LAReviewofBooks. 13/ lareviewofbooks.org/article/piety-…
But palms are "symbiotic infrastructure." Their roots curl into a ball, and plug into sidewalks without entangling underground mains. Also, Mary Pickford loved them because they don't block storefronts, and are ideal for window-shopping from the driver’s seat. 14/
It’s hard to plant big street trees in poor neighborhoods, which have lots of overhead powerlines and narrow sidewalks. In Sidewalks, a study shows that household income is the only statistically significant variable in determining tree canopy. 15/ mitpress.mit.edu/books/sidewalks
Guess where that isn’t a problem? Hancock Park, one of L.A.’s richest neighborhoods, where developers undergrounded all the powerlines. It’s right in the middle of the city, and you can see the tree disparity easily from the air. 16/
People know that trees mean money. In Boyle Heights, a woman pleaded with an arborist not to plant because it would accelerate gentrification. @BrentinMock has written about unwelcome "white environmentalism" in Detroit. 17/ citylab.com/environment/20…
Surveillance is another vector. Requests to deforest are common in heavily policed areas, where shade is perceived as a magnet for drug dealing and prostitution. This is on a block near USC, where neighbors complained about loitering. Looks like it worked! 18/
In the early ‘00s, LAPD installed security cameras in high-crime areas, and asked crews to cut trees that obscured the views. Cops overwhelmed the forestry department, which suggested tree removal in places where “regular maintenance” was not feasible. 19/ cityclerk.lacity.org/lacityclerkcon…
The city has no policy about removing shade for surveillance, but it happens. Public housing courtyards are bare of trees because they block views from pole cameras. When a new camera went up in Harvard Park, in South L.A., the mature tree near it vanished. 20/
“Police convinced community leaders that you can’t have too many trees because it restricts their ability to do their jobs,” an architect told me. I asked a gang detective if that helps reduce crime. Nope—but video "works like a charm" when it comes to charging in court. 21/
Shade just isn't in L.A.'s DNA. After a rezoning in the '30s, high-density developments like rowhouses and tenements were effectively banned, since the prevailing wisdom held that the city shouldn’t feel like New York—dark, cramped, and overcrowded. 22/ tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…
The housing crisis is changing that conversation. But 5-story multi-family buildings will create unwanted shadows. At one point—maybe it still does?—#SB50 would exempt those buildings from environmental review, which is important, because shadows have a price tag. 23/
In Westwood, NIMBYs have complained that shadows would kill their backyard gardens and chill their swimming pools. Years ago, a condo went in after the developer paid $400,000 to the HOA, including $50,000 for private security patrols. cityclerk.lacity.org/lacityclerkcon… 24/
There are so many vectors to shade—cultural, political, economic, and scientific. Don't forget noir—shade is where criminals lurks. But more than anything, when you look at how it gets meted out in L.A., particularly in public, shade is a story of environmental injustice. 25/
People in poor neighborhoods, many of them POC, are exposed to high levels of air pollution, soil toxins, and contaminated water, and higher temperatures on unprotected streets. Because shade is conceived as a luxury, or comfort, we don't consider it a public health issue. 26/
That needs to change. Perhaps we should start talking about shade deserts, just as we talk about neighborhoods without grocery stores as food deserts. Or some other less corny way. Hope this story helps. placesjournal.org/article/shade-… 27/27
