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  • BOOK REVIEW

Greener cities: a necessity or a luxury?

Are urban trees and parks essential to improving the environment and human health — or just a sop to middle-class ideals of gentrification? Two books debate these opposing views.
  1. Timon McPhearson

    1. Timon McPhearson is an urban ecologist and director of the Urban Systems Lab at the New School, New York City.

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The Living City: Why Cities Don’t Need to Be Green to Be Great Des Fitzgerald Basic Books (2023)

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Nature 626, 713-715 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-00477-y

References

  1. McPhearson, T., Kabisch, N. & Frantzeskaki, N. (eds) Nature-Based Solutions for Cities (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2023).

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  2. Keeler, B. L. et al. Nature Sustain. 2, 29–38 (2019).

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  3. Dodman, D. et al. in Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (eds Pörtner, H.-O. et al.) Ch. 6 (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2023).

  4. Andersson, E. et al. AMBIO 43, 445–453 (2014).

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Competing Interests

The author declares no competing interests.

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