RE: Need ideas for sun-blasted parking strip et al.

Title: RE: Need ideas for sun-blasted parking strip et al.

 My son's school has moved to a new location, which needs some immediate landscaping (shade trees and foot traffic barriers).  The school is in Redding, Sunset zone 9; summers are long, very hot (90-110 degrees F) affairs, winters are relatively wet (45 inches of rain) with regular but rarely severe freezing.

I need something (or more than one thing) to populate a narrow (2 feet wide, 80 feet long) parking strip between the paved parking area and a low, south-facing concrete wall that forms the drop-off for the sidewalk in front of the school.  The idea is to keep the children from jumping directly off the sidewalk into the parking lot, and also soften and improve the appearance of the new blocky building. I'd prefer something evergreen.

There will also be several vertical trellises for vines to break up the linear expanse along the front of the building.
So far I have thought of:
1) rosemary (but I'm reluctant to plant such a bee magnet where there will be children in and out, no doubt some of whom will be allergic to bee stings).

2) Raphiolepis (does it pull in bees too?)
3) Grevillea (are there any small enough to fit the space without butchering them at pruning time?)
4) Juniper (boring)
5) Xylosma (boring)
6) Cistus (this is my current front-runner, but it would have to be a relatively small or non-spreading type)
7) Pyracantha (but draws bees, and has thorns that may actually injure someone, including me while pruning)
8) Berberis
9) Ceanothus--my experience with these is not encouraging as far as using them in this tough a planting situation
10) Arctostaphlos--ditto the ceanothus

There must be something wonderful that I've missed.  If you think of what it is, please let me know!

Julie Nelson


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