I need the Green Party's help

[Furet]

Dear Greens and other readers,

I am one of the few people, it seems, who has a paradoxical interest in both the development of Ireland's interurban motorway network AND in enlarging Ireland's broadleaf woodland coverage. Over the past few months I have seen an opportunity to exploit the verges of many of these new roads to plant large swathes of native trees.

Let me explain, taking the recently-opened 37km Cashel to Mitchelstown M8 motorway through Tipperary as an example. Let me first direct you here to this short two-page thread on boards.ie for photos of some of the wasted land associated with this road: New motorway verge maintenance & planting: non existent! - boards.ie , especially posts #25 and #26. These images highlight but a tiny percentage of the unused land on the route. They were taken at the northern end of the scheme, between Cashel and New Inn. South of Cahir, the land wastage is even more pronounced. On straigher sections of the route between Cahir and Mitchelstown the road is not banked by steep verges at all; rather, the sides of the road are broad and flat, and there is a corridor some 20m in width and many kilometers long running the whole length of the M8, totally unused, that would be ideal for tree planting.

I have contacted the NRA about what I regard as the lack of proper landscaping accompanying these schemes. The Authority commented that their new planting policy is designed to reflect the habitat through which the road runs. In the case of the M8, for example, this is grassland, and so the NRA has not planted trees in great numbers in order to blend the route into the fields that flank the road. That is the theory anyway. Obviously the NRA has not considered that Ireland's grasslands are neat and green because they are grazed; obvious too is the fact that the roadsides will not be similarly grazed, so that consequently the grass sown thereon will grow unchecked, turn brown, and become weedy. Hence you get the horrible eyesores highlighted in my photos that blight what should be amongst the most verdant countryside in Ireland.

My proposal is quite simple, cheap, and would involve marshalling schools and local communities. It is this:

In areas where planting is suitable, gather native seed (acorns, ash keys, hazel and larch cones, etc.) and get school children to plant them in pots. In time these would then be planted along suitable parts of the motorway.

The areas that need tree cover most are spaces adjacent to overbridges (as you can see from my pictures); by grade seperated junctions; and along wide, flat areas of roadside where the trees will not fall onto the road. The trees would have many benefits, and, if correctly chosen and situated, would require no maintenance.

I am very interested in making this happen. It would be a project similar, in some respects, to the Millenium Forests enterprise. I'm coming to the Green Party for advice and support, and for help in making this happen. I know that the Greens are not fans of roads, and that is fine. You don't need to be. All I'm asking is for the help of the Green Party, a party of government, to turn this environmental handful of lemons into lemonade.

Things that need to happen include:

- getting government backing, even if this is just verbal support;
- getting the NRA to allow planting to take place and getting them involved
- getting town councils, local authorities, as well as schools and Boards of Management involved
- getting Coillte and the Tree Council involved (for seeds, planting demonstrations etc)

This has the potential to do several things. As well as having obvious environmental benefits, it would allow the Greens, the government and the NRA to appear to be environmentally proactive in a tangiable, practical way. It would also do a lot to educate kids about trees and ecology, and to get communities involved in a national programme of afforestation, rekindling in the process a spirit of volunteerism.

I look forward to your replies. If anyone would like to contact me directly please PM me.

Thanks,

Shane

[zakalwe1]

problem is that trees can obscure visability of the road and of signage. also there are the leaves in autumn to think about - potential for slippery conditions with wet leaves.

[Furet]

problem is that trees can obscure visability of the road and of signage. also there are the leaves in autumn to think about - potential for slippery conditions with wet leaves.

Thanks for the post. I should have preemptively addressed your point in my original post: I didn't emphasize enough the sheer amount of space available FAR from the actual roadside. In many cases you could plant a spate of trees and still have them many metres away from the side of the road. For this reason leaves would not be a problem. Similarly, the proposed trees would be nowhere near road signage: They would be well back on the wasted, unused land. Again, if you look at the photos I link to on the boards.ie thread you will see that in some cases the wasted land extends up to 150m away from the road.

Formerly, roadsides were heavily (and often unsuitably) planted - think of the M7 between Portlaoise and Naas for example, or the dual carriageway between Watergrasshill and Cork City. Two points need to be made about this. Firstly, it's important to grasp that in many cases the NRA does not plant ANYTHING on motorway roadsides anymore. All you get is wild grass and weeds. Secondly, my plan differs hugely from, for example, the M7 planting scheme or the planting scheme on the approach to Cork in that in my case trees would not be planted so close to the roadway and, in addition, I would choose trees - native trees - that don't require any maintenance, rather than the shrubs that do require annual pruning on the M7 and M1.

Again, the important point here is the unprecedented volume of wasted land that accompanies these newer road schemes. Take this photo as an example: Image:M8Tipperary.JPG - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia and look at the left hand side of the picture: note the brownish line of unused land. Note also the laneway that runs alongside it. Now, believe me when I say this, on the other side of the motorway out of the photo's field is a length of unused land (WITHOUT a lane) that is twice as wide, just as far from the motorway's mainline, stretching several kilometres long. Again, I reiterate: it is unused and unplanted, owned by the NRA but not doing anything. It could be planted with thousands of native trees at minimal cost in a way that wouldn't affect the road one single bit.

[Furet]

Again: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...unction_10.jpg see the right hand side. A single line of trees could be planted here, or even just a few single trees. This photo actually shows an area with minimum wastage; other areas have far more expansive tracts of unused land.

[drbob1972]

assuming it can be done safely i think its a great idea, driving through forests or tree lined roads is wonderful, i travel through the glen of the downes in wicklow most days and its my favourite bit of the journey esp this time of year when the autumnal colours are so stunning....

[White Horse]

I look forward to your replies. If anyone would like to contact me directly please PM me.

Two grand in a brown envelope and we can talk.

[coc]

Seconded. A great way of offsetting (to some small extent at least) what must be an appalling carbon footprint. Where do I sign?

[Furet]

For those not wanting to trawl through the boards.ie thread, the photos are viewable here: boards.ie - View Single Post - New motorway verge maintenance & planting: non existent!. As you can see, there are acres of land that could be planted with trees without any danger to the road at all.

[Furet]

Seconded. A great way of offsetting (to some small extent at least) what must be an appalling carbon footprint. Where do I sign?

That's the thing: I don't even know where I should sign.

I sent an email to Mary White TD shortly after posting this thread inviting her to read over my suggestions. Beyond that, I don't know who to contact or how one even starts setting up a group. In fact I'm not even sure if setting up a group is the best way to go about this (though I'd certainly try to establish one if it was the best option). Maybe all that's required is for existing bodies to take up the suggestion and go from there. Thoughts?

[ibis]

That's the thing: I don't even know where I should sign.

I sent an email to Mary White TD shortly after posting this thread inviting her to read over my suggestions. Beyond that, I don't know who to contact or how one even starts setting up a group. In fact I'm not even sure if setting up a group is the best way to go about this (though I'd certainly try to establish one if it was the best option). Maybe all that's required is for existing bodies to take up the suggestion and go from there. Thoughts?

I would say that you need to:

1. publicise the idea
2. gather popular support for the idea
3. drum up political support for the idea

So you need publicity, money, and 'champions'.

1. set up a website to publicise the idea, and allow people to express their support - ideally, allow them to donate to the campaign as well

2. when you've got a bit of public interest per the website, publicise that to local journalists. Try and get yourself on the radio and in the papers, ideally with a pic. Send round press releases every so often - eventually you'll hit a slow news day and someone will use the content - make sure you get your contact details in there. If you want to target journalists, pick those who are either interested in transport or the Irish environment.

3. talk to existing lobby groups involved in areas like planning and land management - An Taisce, people like that. If they're not interested themselves, they can probably point you in the right direction.

4. talk to local chambers of commerce and other local groups that might be interested in getting involved - the Tidy Towns Committees might be a good bet too.

5. lobby TD's and Councillors regularly - there's good photo-ops in this for them, plus green kudos, but they probably won't do anything unless they're assured of a bit of publicity.

6. invite any other interested/passionate supporters to set up local equivalents for their area, so that you get as much coverage as possible.

7. repeat until thickly forested.

It's not rocket science, after all - it's slog. Probably the last people I would talk to are the State agencies.