Neighbourwoods

, a community-based tree inventory, monitoring and stewardship planning program. Neighbourwoods is designed to help community groups and volunteers conduct an inventory of their urban forest and use that information to inform urban forest stewardship in their communities and neighbourhoods. Neighbourwoods is also an exciting way of being active, in... teracting with the people in your community and learning all about the trees in and around where you live ( More about Neighbourwoods© ) Neighbourwoods© was developed by Dr. W.A. Kenney and Dr. D. Puric-Mladenovic to assist communities and professionals in collecting the tree information they need to strategically plan and manage their urban forest. Since its inception in 1995, Neighbourwoods© has been used and applied by many communities across Ontario and beyond. The three components of Neighbourwoods are: a) Tree inventory, monitoring and mapping procedure and training b) tree inventory data analysis c) urban forest stewardship and management planning. Trees are valuable natural resources that improve the quality of life in our communities and make our neighbourhoods greener and more livable while providing many other social and ecological benefits. With an increasing need for greener and more sustainable urban communities, there is also a growing awareness of the value of trees in urban landscapes. Associated with this awareness is the recognition that sustaining the urban trees and their many benefits is only possible through strategic and long-term urban forest management, planning and conservation across our cities, towns and villages. However, when addressing this need, we are often confronted with the lack of meaningful and stewardship-relevant information which can help us make informed, evidence-based decisions. Within the North American urban land-use pattern, the majority of urban trees are on privately owned lands that include residential, commercial, institutional and industrial areas. For example, although residential areas constitute 50% to over 80% ...Read More