For decades, New York has been associated with skyscrapers, traffic and tightly packed neighbourhoods rather than large-scale environmental restoration. Yet across the city's streets, parks and residential areas, an enormous change has been taking place almost unnoticed. Trees planted years ago are now reaching maturity, casting wider shade over pavements, cooling busy roads and gradually altering the character of many communities. As hotter summers become more common, the long-term value of those earlier planting efforts is becoming easier to measure.
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