According to a first-of-its-kind study published on June 11, 2024, in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, redlining, a discriminatory lending practice originating in the 1930s, has significantly altered wildlife distribution in four of California’s largest cities. Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley, and the Lincoln Park Zoo Wildlife Institute discovered that historically redlined neighborhoods in Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco, and Oakland have lower levels of native and non-native wildlife biodiversity compared to greenlined neighborhoods. Using data from the iNaturalist citizen science platform, the researchers uncovered large differences in the types of mammals, birds, insects, … Continue reading How Redlining Impacted Urban Wildlife: Major California Cities Show Up to Ten Times Fewer Species