When a record-breaking heat dome hit the Pacific Northwest in 2021, sending Portland temperatures soaring to an average high of 116 degrees, Vivek Shandas set out to do some research.
Shandas, a professor at Portland State University who specializes in urban climate change adaptation, suspected the heat—already scorching in Portland’s wealthiest neighborhoods—would be even worse in places like East Portland, where parking lots are more abundant than green space and foliage.
His hypothesis was correct: At a parking lot in outer Southeast Portland’s Lents neighborhood, Shandas measured a high temperature of 124 degrees. Meanwhile, people in leafy Northwest Portland were experiencing a relatively balmy 99 degree day.
Three summers and multiple (slightly milder) heat waves later, Shandas continues to talk about the disparate impacts of heat on Portlanders,and so do many advocates in the city. One key point they want to get across? Portland’s inequitable distribution of shady trees isn’t an accident. But it can be fixed.
On July 17, environmental non-profit 350 PDX hosted their third annual Urban Shade Equity Ride, meant to “highlight the critical issue of shade equity in Portland, emphasizing the current disparities in urban heat exposure due to historic racial discrimination.” The bike ride, which saw about 80 participants this year, started in East Portland’s Lents Park and ended in Laurelhurst Park, winding through several miles of streets with varying amounts of shade along the way. The average city temperature was in the high 80s, but it felt hotter on streets in Lents and Mt. Scott-Arleta than under the Laurelhurst neighborhood’s rich canopy—and that was the point.
“It’s an extraordinary opportunity to be thinking about trees in the summer, especially when they’re fully out and vibrant, fully shining some of their best light and shade upon us,” Shandas said at the beginning of the ride, standing under a grove of oak and Douglas fir trees in Lents Park. “The interesting thing about these trees is that they aren’t here by coincidence. This is not natural selection, it’s a very deliberate act of policy and planning.”
Neighborhoods like Lents and Laurelhurst have some key differences beyond access to trees. According to Portland neighborhood profile maps, the average income in Lents and surrounding east Portland neighborhoods is well below the city’s overall average, and the disparity has grown significantly since 2010. Meanwhile, residents of Laurelhurst earn about 50 percent more than the average Portlander, and more than double what the average Lents resident takes in.
East Portland neighborhoods are also much more diverse than Portland as a whole, whereas the wealthiest parts of the city are much whiter. And it’s no coincidence that the map of Portland’s neighborhoods by wealth distribution lines up almost perfectly with the city’s tree density map.
“An entire system of alienation and exclusion and racism led to the creation of those maps, which are just artifacts of something that’s far more entrenched and insidious in the way we go about managing our spaces and places,” Shandas said.
Throughout the ride, other differences in Portland’s streetscape became evident, too. It wasn’t until the late 20th century that Portland officially annexed neighborhoods east of 82nd Avenue into the city, and the area still suffers from neglect. The area surrounding the old Mall 205, now Portland’s go-to destination for big box shopping, teems with parking lots, which radiate heat in the summertime. And the majority of the city’s high-crash intersections are located east of 82nd Avenue, as those traveling by bus, bike, or on foot contend with unsafe infrastructure and excessively fast car traffic.
But there’s reason for hope. Actually, there’s more than one reason. The city is currently working on several projects to increase tree canopy coverage in East Portland and overall make the area’s streets safer.
During the ride, Portland Bureau of Transportation (PBOT) Pedestrian Coordinator Gena Gastaldi spoke about the Trees in the Curb Zone pilot project, which PBOT, Portland Parks & Recreation, and the Bureau of Environmental Services have been planning for almost two years. Just yesterday, PBOT announced construction on the first phase of the project will begin this month, “repurposing underutilized parking spaces” on Southeast Duke Street from 82nd to 92nd avenues to make room for 15 street trees.
Gastaldi said the plan to plant trees in the curb zone was hatched during the 2021 heat dome, when it became clear that people in East Portland needed more trees. But on streets like SE Duke, there isn’t much of a planting zone behind the curb for trees to go, so planners had to get creative. Portland Urban Forestry staff plan to plant the new trees this fall and winter.
The city is also working on a multimillion-dollar 82nd Avenue revamp, which will add new and upgraded crossings to the street, as well as landscaped medians and dozens of new street trees. During the public engagement process for the 82nd Avenue process, participants repeatedly expressed their interest in street trees. Trees are also a major component of the plan to reshape 122nd Avenue.
The Portland Clean Energy Community Benefits Fund's Equitable Tree Canopy program, administered by Portland Parks & Recreation, also intends to plant trees in historically neglected parts of Portland. The program to aims to "address environmental equity, combat urban heat islands, and create sustainable urban environments for future generations" by planting "at least 15,000 trees on public and private property, maintaining tree health, fostering community engagement, and supporting workforce development in the tree establishment and maintenance industry."
But the upcoming change that may have the largest, longest-lasting impact for East Portlanders is the reshaping of City Council. Portland’s new government will have 12 councilors who will represent four geographic areas across the city, including one district encompassing East Portland. Come January of next year, there will be more residents of East Portland in City Hall than in every other City Council term combined. Climate justice and equity have also been top priorities for City Council candidates in other districts, too.
Several of those candidates attended the Shade Equity Ride, representing each of the four districts. Some pitched their plans for adding more shade to the city. District 4 candidate Michael Trimble promised to plant one million trees in Portland during his first year in office. Others touted their longtime commitment to environmentalism.
To ride organizers from 350 PDX and advocates like Shandas, it’s important that the new councilors know there are policy steps they can take to make Portland more habitable as the climate warms, and to do it equitably.
“The systemic issues that are still very present in many of the city planning approaches and documents and ways that we look at the places that have and have not trees,” Shandas said. “This is a whole system that we’re trying to work within, and I’m so glad to have prospective City Council members here to really start speaking to the approaches we can use to bring in the climate and equity connection in the process of what it means to live in a thriving, verdant landscape like Portland.”
