LA is HOT. But does it have to be this hot? Did you know shade from a single tree can drop temps by 20° or more? Yet working-class neighborhoods like South LA, East LA, and the Valley get the least tree coverage and bear the brunt of extreme heat. Let's change that and finally cool things down for everyone.
Voices
Letters
Los Angeles Times
Re: "Filling in L.A.'s treeless gaps with 'built shade'," Oct. 10, 2026
"Shade is the new sunshine" -- and for good reason, as the hot places cook under the assault of relentless global heating and record hot temperatures become the greatest climate-related killer of people and nastiest problem for the conduct of daily life.
Building shade is a creative opportunity made to order for climate-conscious Los Angeles. This city and region should establish a "Shade Skunkworks": a public-private schools-and-citizens think-and-do tank to design and trial beta versions of novel new forms of built shade at all scales, in all forms simple and super to deploy here and export to a hot world. Simple shade, like shading roof extensions on our small bus shelters, to kinetic shade architecture with specialized drones that lift and anchor on pylons large shade sails as needed over parks, plazas and pools, theme parks and outdoor work sites; from "built trees" and "floratecture" canopies of flowering living vines, to new-tech shade systems of multiple inflatable and deflatable balloons on compressed air lines, to extendable and retractable manufactured modular components. And the scientifically informed deployment of nature's infrastructure of trees, such as with fast-growing "megaflora tree. "And experimental offshore marine cloud brightening with flettner vessels stirring up sea mist (researched at UCLA in the '90s) to augment the cooling marine layer over our city during onshore winds to cool the cityscape and lower the AC cooling load and electricity consumption of our buildings.
Donald Trump boasts that America is a "hot country." Los Angeles will succeed by becoming a cool (and cooler) city!
Gregory Wright
Voices
Letters
Los Angeles Times
Re: "Filling in L.A.'s treeless gaps with 'built shade'," Oct. 10, 2026
"Shade is the new sunshine" -- and for good reason, as the hot places cook under the assault of relentless global heating and record hot temperatures become the greatest climate-related killer of people and nastiest problem for the conduct of daily life.
Building shade is a creative opportunity made to order for climate-conscious Los Angeles. This city and region should establish a "Shade Skunkworks": a public-private schools-and-citizens think-and-do tank to design and trial beta versions of novel new forms of built shade at all scales, in all forms simple and super to deploy here and export to a hot world. Simple shade, like shading roof extensions on our small bus shelters, to kinetic shade architecture with specialized drones that lift and anchor on pylons large shade sails as needed over parks, plazas and pools, theme parks and outdoor work sites; from "built trees" and "floratecture" canopies of flowering living vines, to new-tech shade systems of multiple inflatable and deflatable balloons on compressed air lines, to extendable and retractable manufactured modular components. And the scientifically informed deployment of nature's infrastructure of trees, such as with fast-growing "megaflora tree. "And experimental offshore marine cloud brightening with flettner vessels stirring up sea mist (researched at UCLA in the '90s) to augment the cooling marine layer over our city during onshore winds to cool the cityscape and lower the AC cooling load and electricity consumption of our buildings.
Donald Trump boasts that America is a "hot country." Los Angeles will succeed by becoming a cool (and cooler) city!
Gregory Wright