By Maddie Miley
The New York City Street Tree Census has been conducted every 10 years since 1995. The Street Tree Census was created in order to count the number of street trees in the city as well as their species, diameter, and condition. Since its inception in 1995, the Street Tree Census has proven to be a helpful management tool for the New York City’s Parks Department, but it has also allowed researchers to explore the relationship of street trees and demographic makeup of New York City.
I wanted to explore the increase of street trees between 2005 and 2015 and the demographic characteristics of the census tracts that they were planted in. Using R, I employed the Stargazer package to create an output table for 2 regressions. Regression 1 explores the relationship between the following demographic variables of population density (PopulationDensity), the percent composition of non-white residents (PercentNonWhite), and the median income (MedianIncome) and the increase in street streets per census tract. Regression 2 incorporates another variable, street tree density, to explore whether the opportunity to plant has significance as well.
As shown below from the outputs of the regressions, there is a significance between the demographic characteristics and the increase in street trees over the ten year period. In Regression 2, we also see significance between the increase in street trees and the demographic characteristics, as well as, the additional variable of street tree density. These results show that census tracts with an already high street tree density in 2005 would have less potential for new trees in 2015.
Sources:
https://www.nycgovparks.org/trees/treescount
https://data.cityofnewyork.us/Environment/2015-Street-Tree-Census-Tree-Data/pi5s-9p35
https://data.cityofnewyork.us/Environment/2005-Street-Tree-Census/29bw-z7pj
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