How America’s hottest city is trying to cool down – Can trees help save Phoenix from extreme heat?

By Joss Fong (Vox)

In this article, Joss Fong addresses how the city of Phoenix, Arizona, is trying to lower temperatures in the city by planting more trees and, especially, spreading them equally throughout the city. Furthermore, she explains three ways in which trees can help to cool the area around them down. She also elaborates on why Phoenix is trying to lower the temperatures by talking about current heatwaves.

The article’s lead is a little too long, and the sentence structure is very complex. It does summarize the most important information of the article, though. I’d say the topic is newsworthy because it is about recent developments and has a big impact on people living close by. However, there are important news values that the article doesn’t cover, such as human interest and conflict. That is why I can imagine that many people outside of Arizona are not very interested in it. However, it might be very appealing to the majority of readers, including me, because it is very short. The author only mentioned relevant information, mainly “how do trees help?” and “why is help needed?” She should definitely avoid including herself in the story, which she does in the last paragraph. In addition to the article, there is a short video, which provides some additional information on the topic. That is what I like most because having visual material is always refreshing, and the video itself is very well done, in my opinion. I honestly really liked the article, even though I mentioned some aspects that are not ideal.

https://www.vox.com/videos/2021/9/20/22683888/sonoran-desert-phoenix-tree-equity

An hour ago, I didn’t know that I would have to talk too so many strangers in one morning. A scavenger hunt forced me to do so in order to complete two objectives: #1 a conversation about the weather and #2 a piece of gum that isn’t pink.

Therefore, I started all my conversations with: “hi, do you happen to have gum on you that isn’t pink?” Yeah, that’s weird. But hey, I couldn’t afford to lose time having conversations with 50 people and later finding out that they don’t have gum on them (because believe me, most people don’t).

The first conversation I had was with Matt. He was sitting behind a desk in the Student Government Office. He didn’t have gum, but he’s been here for a while and could tell me something about the weather here. In general, he likes the weather in Iowa, he said. When I asked him when it would begin to snow he said: “It could start snowing in two to three weeks, it could Strat snowing in two months. But once it starts, it’s not going to stop.”

After that, I still had to get a piece of gum. So, I talked to about ten people before I found my lifesaver, sitting there at a table with two other people and having a virtual meeting – Pastor Andy. Technically, I knew him before. But I haven’t talked to him one on one yet, so he basically is a stranger. I imagined him to be a super nice guy, and I was proven right. When I told him I needed a piece of gum, he simply reached for his backpack and said: “how many pieces do you need?”

This is where my scavenger hunt ended. This class was definitely unusual.