I can't quite figure this out. The numbers seem to speak for themselves, and certainly the parking lot streetscape that flight from the urban core in the '60s and '70s speaks for itself.
But a simple windshield survey calls our lack of trees into serious question. Most of the urban streets are tree-lined, certainly once you get outside the ~12-block downtown center.
I seriously wonder if the statisticians took our 2002 merger into account. When the old city merged into the subdivision-rich suburbs, did the average tree count for the metro take a nose-dive for a reason that wouldn't be apparent to someone who simply looked at the numbers? Things to wonder about on a morning when I need to be working.