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Urban Resources Initiative

grant award: $69,074; year awarded: 2022

Climate stressors and the effects of climate change are heightened in urban areas. For example, temperatures are well-documented to already be higher in cities than in adjacent rural areas due to urban heat island (UHI) effects. The UHI effect typically disproportionately impacts lower-income and majority-BIPOC communities, a trend exacerbated by members of these communities often being excluded from environmental decision-making. Climate change will make urban forested natural areas even more crucial to human health and quality of life in cities, as they are key to ameliorating UHI, capturing stormwater, and reducing air pollution. At the same time, target forest is an important resource for biodiversity and source of ecological functions for wildlife. Urban Resources Initiative will test new methods for restoring canopy gaps in three of the largest forested natural areas in New Haven, including an evaluation of whether assisted migration of oaks from southern provenances may help ensure future forests are more resilient to climate change’s impacts.