Palm trees are a symbol of the Los Angeles (LA) area, like the Empire State Building in New York or the Space Needle in Seattle. With tall trunks and thick leaves, palm trees have long dominated the LA skyline. However, recently, there has been a growing call in LA to remove the palm trees that line the urban areas.
On the 30th (local time), The Washington Post (WP) reported, "A considerable number of palm trees contributed to the wildfires that swept through Southern California earlier this year, leading to over 166,000 buildings being burned and at least 29 deaths," noting that "some argue that these iconic trees do not provide sufficient shade and pose a significant fire risk."
In fact, palm trees are not native to LA. Spanish missionaries brought date palms to the LA area in the 18th century, and later, settlers moving west planted another species known as California fan palms. During the Great Depression, LA planted thousands of palm trees as a way to create jobs and improve aesthetics ahead of the 1932 Olympics. Since then, palm trees have become a symbol of LA.
Critics of palm trees argue that their tall trunks cause flames to shoot up into the air during fires. Nick Jensen, head of the conservation program at the California Native Plant Society, said, "As the tree grows, the brown dead leaves accumulate under the green leaves, spreading fire," noting that "palm trees serve as a reservoir for embers."
Palm trees not only serve as 'kindling' but also make firefighting more challenging. The New York Times (NYT) reported, "When a tall palm tree catches fire, firefighters find it difficult to extinguish," adding that "the high, burning fronds of palm trees can spread embers far away, causing more fires and making it harder to control them," according to landscape architect Esther Maguliez, a professor at the University of Southern California, who stated, "Officials should remove palm trees in fire-prone areas."
The fact that palm trees provide almost no shade during heatwaves supports the argument for their removal. The oak tree, commonly used as a street tree, grows to less than 70 feet (21 meters) and typically provides shade that reaches double that height. In contrast, the 'Mexican fan palm,' a common type of palm in LA, can grow up to 100 feet (about 30 meters), but its shade width is only about 10 to 18 feet (3 to 5 meters).
One of the main purposes of street trees is to provide shelter from sunlight for pedestrians, and palm trees do not fulfill this role adequately. This is a critical drawback in LA, where heatwaves occur frequently. In 2019, then-LA Mayor Eric Michael Garcetti initiated a campaign to plant 90,000 trees, primarily of non-palm species, to create jobs and improve aesthetics. Recently, it has been reported that private housing developers are also reluctant to plant palm trees.
Brian Behahr, a senior arborist with TreePeople, one of LA's tree-planting organizations, said, "I don't think we should completely eliminate palm trees in LA," but added, "however, considering the functional value of trees, it's not in harmony with nature to plant palm trees en masse."