[Urbanstudy] Butchering Trees and Pavements

[Yashdeep Srivastava]

Thank you, Ravi for drawing our attention to the wider impact of the HCBS in Delhi.

My question as a rank outsider, and not even a resident of India, is:

  a.. While the cutting down of trees is clearly gut-wrenching, especially to those for whom they have special meaning, is it not true that the HCBS will have a beneficial ramifications on the wider society  (read as those who do not drive cars) in the long run?
  b.. I am not an advocate to justify the means employed towards the HCBS end, but are not trees a renewable resource, and while the cutting down of trees may impact the immediate aesthetics of the street, will not the sutainable benefits of improved public transport outlast this short-term disturnbance to the streetscape?
I look forward to my narrow assumptions being corrected.


Regards,

Yashdeep Srivastava
Melbourne, Australia
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: Ravi Agarwal 
  To: urbanstudygroup sarai 
  Sent: Friday, March 02, 2007 5:51 PM
  Subject: [Urbanstudy] Butchering Trees and Pavements


  Dear all,

  As I spend another morning today trying to gather evidence of the 
  trees , over 2500, marked for felling, I find I cannot shoot for more 
  than some minutes. To see fully grown trees, of all shades and 
  varieties, the type you cannot find in Delhi any more, some over 50 
  years old marked for felling in yellow ink and numbers etched onto 
  the tree trunks, is more than I can accept. Behind the construction 
  boards of the HSBS ( High Capacity Bus Service) lies a trail of 
  disaster. Uprooted giants of trees, some axed, some bleeding at the 
  roots, mercilessly felled.

  I know of no other city where 8 land higways criss cross it. ( From 
  exisiting 6 lane this will now become 8 lane with the new service). 
  Cleave it through and hack all that in its way. And a citenzery whcih 
  is so quiet that it took a week to even get the media to do a story 
  on it, and that also only via a concerned reporter. There is such 
  silence and such uncertainty. The isolation which can be afforded 
  through the window panes of cars, where we sit an decide if we can 
  afford to raise our voices or maybe this will go away and no one will 
  know. Like it never hapenned.

  My friend the photo printer told me "dil dehal jaata hai jab mei us 
  sarak per jaato hoon. Kitne bade and sunder per, aise hi kaat 
  denge.?" My heart stops when I go on that road, will such big and 
  majestic trees just be cut? Another friend who lives in Saket, 
  refuses to look out of the taxi window, since it upsets her so much. 
  Like it does me.

  Whose consensus was sought. When this project was approved. Who made 
  the decision that the road is needed. Who saw the traffic studies? 
  Who justified it. Who executed it? How is the consensus made? How are 
  such decisions taken? Someone's pet project. Someone well respected 
  in the city. Someone who has always talked about pedisterisation and 
  cycle ways. Now that very project stripping the city of trees, and 
  pavements. For a high capacity bus!

  In the last post I wrote about my inability to act. I wonder if it is 
  the larger inability to act. How we seem to have said 'yes' without 
  saying anything. How we maybe are caught up in our not wanting to 
  neogotiate our little gains or how we justify them to ourselves (the 
  city needs better transport! - read as "I like my car!"). There is 
  not point thinking and pontificating if we are not prepared to 
  participate in what is going on. The city has been changing as I 
  write. By April end, the city would have lost over 3000 of its most 
  glorious and old trees. Then we can get to work on time. I suppose - 
  to a better future!

  ravi agarwal



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