Should Sheffield replant its lost street trees before 2030, and if so, should the council prioritise the most deprived wards where canopy cover is lowest, even if that means fewer trees on the leafier suburban streets?

Hello, I'm Wilson, and this one is for you alone. You want to know whether Sheffield should replant the street trees it lost before the end of this decade, and whether the council should send most of those new trees to the poorer wards where canopy is thinnest, even if that leaves the leafier suburbs waiting. Let me say plainly what I think the question really turns on, because it is not really about trees in the abstract. It turns on what a street tree is for. If a street tree is mainly an ornament, a pleasant thing that makes a road look settled, then you would replace trees where they were lost, like for like, and the suburbs that lost the most would get the most back. If a street tree is public infrastructure, something that cools a street on a hot afternoon, soaks up rain before it floods a drain, filters traffic fumes and makes people more willing to walk, then you would plant it where those services are scarcest and most needed. Sheffield has a particular history here. Under the Streets Ahead highways contract with Amey, the city felled thousands of street trees in the years after 2012, and …