Comment and UK Research

I have the benefit of living in a suburb with plenty of tree cover. In fact the view outside onto the streets is almost as if the street is a parkland. The concept that any suburb should have an abundance of trees and shrubs and associated bio-diversity is simply so logical that one wonders why would anyone think otherwise.

Alas, I am not in the majority on these thoughts. Any visit to new suburbs and new housing developments in Australia is an eye opener because in most cases the amount of trees are at an absolute minimum. Many of these new areas are to be health traps as electricity prices increase and as they suffer from the dreaded heat island effect.

Therefore it was with some curiosity that I noted that someone in the UK is setting out to research the topic. My reaction is – again! What new research do we need?

It seems that the benefits of urban trees is to be a continuous subject of research. This despite that well documented fact that all the answers have already been supplied. The evidence is clear.

The real problem is that we still have so many agencies that do not make the supply of very generous urban trees as a mandatory requirement for all new developments and inner city re-developments. The research that is required is to uncover what it is that informs planning and development agencies of the obvious? What is it that makes such implementation of such policies a taken for granted criteria for planning and development?

Here’s the link – click here

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Paul Costigan 13 July 2014