It seems to me that that logic could be applied to playgrounds in general regardless of whether they include shade.
Playgrounds have gotten much better than they were a few decades ago when I was a kid. I don’t see any reason that that can’t continue with putting an emphasis on including shade.
This accounts for about 90% of the problem with everything. Voter turnout in my state in the primary, where we have mail-in voting for all (IE: no excuse for people not to vote), during a presidential election year, was below 50%. And then people complain about their elected officials! People don't attend public meetings, they don't contact their elected officials, they don't come to political party meetings or get involved -- but those same people will tell you to your face that both parties are the same and that they feel powerless to fix government! Especially at a local level -- school board, city council, county, and state -- the average citizen has so stinking much opportunity that they don't even realize their own power! You want to get something fixed? Set up a meeting or two with your electeds. Don't get the response you want? Find ways to create a citizens movement. Can't get what you want in your municipality? Find a sympathetic state legislator or two who can push from the top town. Really upset? Run for office yourself or help get the people you want elected.
Canopies are made of fabric and degrade; they need maintenance and replacement, which isn't going to happen in America. Instead, they'll be put up once (at great expense, with some company profiting handsomely, and it just so happens that company is owned by the brother of someone important on the city council), and then just left there. After a few years, there will be holes in the canopy and it'll look like the movie "I Am Legend" (where the city degrades quickly because all the people are gone and no one's doing maintenance), and no one will want to play there. Parents will complain, but the city will push back because fixing it requires demolishing and rebuilding the entire playground, which is very expensive and not in the city's budget.
They're relatively cheap and easy to replace, having a neighbourhood play action committee can handle the costs every five years to a decade with regular bake sales.
What's more of an issue is
> Canopies are made of [ Plastic ] fabric
typically knitted polyethylene blend | woven polypropylene. The degradation of tens of thousands of kilometers of plastic shadecloth each year is a big source of microplastics in the environment .. which has been getting some bad press of late.
That is still a bargain for the services that the tree provides.
The best "premium shadow package" available on the market. Comprises: filtered light, relaxing breeze sounds, noise blocker, chirping birds and flowers, dumb squirrels frolicking around and fresh soil, all in the same package for just ten dollars a sapling.
$10 for a sapling is extremely cheap. That's more in the line of what you can expect to pay for a 2 year old seedling (ref: https://monroecd.org/tree-sale-2024/). But I agree. I've planted 10k+ seedlings (most not personally; I hired a crew). It's actually fun to watch them grow. Douglas Firs take about 5 years to grow to 5' (from 18"). After that, they grow 3'+ a year. Not being a food source, they don't attract wildlife though nor do they have flowers.
