The Street Trees of China

An overview of the common street trees found in China

Trees make a happy urban landscape. Think of some happy cities. Paris, right? Lots of trees there. Trees in a city are subconciously telling you, "I've been here a for while, this city was not built overnight".

Most cities are also intolerably hot for at least some part of the year. Trees help a lot here, not just with their shade, but with their green organic selves helping to balance out all the heat reflecting pavement.

Here in China, street trees are a big thing. Even the early communists seemed to have liked them and planted endless avenues of trees in the aesthetically dead days of the cultural revolution. (Click here to open a new window with pictures of the trees) Some common street trees in China are:

The Chinese Scholar Tree (Sophora japonica)
The most common of the trees here in Xi'an, a plaque stuck to one of the bigger specimens in the muslim quarter calls it a Xi'an locust.

Asian Plane Tree (probably Plantanus orientalis)
I've heard some people complain that the seeds in spring get in your eyes and are really annoying.

Ginko (Ginko biloba)
These are planted along one of the biggest streets in Xi'an (Nan da Jie) and appear to be doing fairly well. I haven't yet asked anyone whether they are male or females (females produce berries in the fall that stink like rotting flesh).

Red Bud (Cercis chinensis)
Red buds can be found down some smaller streets. Some of them seem to be doing well, but most look tortured and stunted.

Cottonwood
This is usually planted as a one off, or at best, in a short row next to an apartment building. Many of these trees in Xi'an are quite big. I couldn't find an asian variety of the cottonwood listed anywhere. Like the cottonwoods I'm familiar with (Populus deltoides) they seed the air with their cotton in spring. However, like many willows, they grow extremely straight.