Breaking Up with the Blacktop 💔🚜

— Written by the Pique Action Team

The Living City: School’s Out for Asphalt 🎒🌳

Welcome back to The Living City, our miniseries exploring hard-working, nature-based urban solutions. This week, we’re having a long-overdue talk with asphalt (and its gray cousin, concrete) about why it’s finally time to move on.

What’s the big deal? Asphalt is used for roads, which is how we get around the city. Yes, asphalt is a relatively inexpensive paving surface that makes life easier for cars, but unfortunately, it also acts as a toxic, non-porous outdoor heater, trapping extreme heat, spreading chemical-laden runoff, and starving the water table—a complete roadblock for urban resilience.

Depaving is the physical removal of impervious surfaces like concrete and asphalt to restore the soil’s ability to absorb water and support life.

Across the globe, cities are finally deciding it is time to have the talk and officially break up with their asphalt. This grassroots movement found its footing in Portland, Oregon, where the nonprofit Depave began hosting community un-paving parties in 2008. Since then, the trend has gone viral. Paris is transforming its schoolyards into Oasis courtyards, and Chicago has liberated thousands of square feet of neighborhood concrete. These cities are proving that when we strip away the gray, we reveal a greener, more resilient future.

The Hard Truth: L.A. County’s Pavement Problem 🔥

Los Angeles is often dubbed a concrete jungle, but new data suggests we have been a bit heavy-handed with the hardscape. A recent DepaveLA analysis from Accelerate Resilience L.A. (ARLA) reveals that a staggering 44% of L.A. County’s 312,000 acres of pavement—an area larger than the city of San Diego—serves no essential purpose for roads or parking. This unnecessary gray matter traps heat, prevents water from soaking into the ground, and leaves our neighborhoods parched. (Check out the map 🗺️ for hot spots.)

The Blacktop Burn: Why Pavement Is a Health Hazard 🌡️

Nowhere is this pavement problem more evident than on LA County school campuses. Across the county, 3,179 schools are smothered in blacktop, leaving students with roughly 137 square feet of pavement per kid. On sweltering days, these surfaces can bake at up to a blistering 180°F, which can burn skin in seconds. This transforms a simple game of tag into a high-stakes survival exercise. Instead of cooling trees, children are surrounded by an outdoor heater that worsens local air quality while heightening flood risks.

A Smarter School of Thought: Biology as Infrastructure 🧠

Transitioning these 15,240 acres of school pavement into rain gardens and nature-based play areas safeguards our students against extreme weather. We have concrete evidence that these changes work. By stripping away the asphalt, we create sponge campuses that absorb storms and offer students much-needed shade. Replacing deafening heat with quiet, imaginative green zones turns a playground from a liability into a literal lifesaver.

The Roadmap to Resilience: ARLA’s Call to Action 🌿

To make this vision a reality, ARLA recommends the creation of a cross-jurisdictional School Greening Roundtable. This taskforce would help districts coordinate and incentivize the removal of asphalt, ensuring that greening efforts reach the schools that need them most. It is time for our leaders to step up to the plate and ensure our children aren't just learning about the environment, but learning within a healthy one. We shouldn't let this opportunity slip through our fingers (or our storm drains).

Take a 15-Minute Climate Action: 📣

The Playground Check 📋️ 

Most schoolyards are hidden behind fences, but their heat impacts the whole neighborhood.

• Step 1: Visit a local schoolyard with a thermometer or simply use your palm to feel the surface temperature of the pavement on a sunny day.

• Step 2: Send a note to your local school board member. Remind them that school infrastructure is climate infrastructure and point them toward ARLA’s DepaveLA framework.

• Step 3: Ask about available School Greening grants to help fund the transition from blacktop to biosphere.

Sneak Pique 👀

Next week: We are heading to the pitch. Find out why synthetic turf on sports fields is a plastic heat trap and how your community’s favorite soccer field might be moonlighting as an outdoor radiator.

📣 Community Announcements 📣 

Hollywood Climate Summit is back in LA!

• 🗓️ When: June 3 & 4 in Los Angeles.

• 🌟 Featuring: Cast/creators from Star Trek: Strange New Worlds & Pluribus, Reggie Watts (comedy), Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, former NASA astronaut Garrett Reisman, and more.

• 🎟️ Discount: Get 25% off any ticket with code HCS25. All tickets include plant-based meals & networking.

• 🔗 Full Lineup: The Wrap's Press Release | HCS website

$1M Open Call: Climate Futures + Immersive Media 🚀

Agog just announced its first open call: Climate Futures + Immersive Media.

• Grants: $25K–$200K for innovators, artists, organizers, impact-focused orgs, researchers, & studios.

• Requirement: No XR experience required.

• Deadline: June 12 → agog.org/opencall2026