Chriscityplan

                                 Urban Trees

        (Join the movement “Plant 1 million trees on your neighborhood” - launched by our first lady, Ibu Ani SBY”)

If  you are  traveling  from one city to others, you will notice the different between one city and others.  With the unique of  welcoming entrance  or street with green  boulevard in the middle of  it, you will  impress. You  will feel the difference and notice which city is manageable or unmanageable.

Recently, not many cities have a boulevard with good quality of street and trees along side the road. In our country, some old cities have boulevard, such as Malang and Bogor. Nowadays, not all new cities have boulevard. Some boulevards are built by developer and maintained by communities. On the other hand, trees along road have removed because road need widen.

Which area on your city has boulevard like this picture? What do you feel if you walk through? (Picture taken from Saudi Arabia)

Trees are an important element of the city. Are there any places where you live without trees? Without trees, cities looks like a desert that you want to leave as soon as possible. Based on brochure “Urban Trees” from United States Department of Agriculture Southern Region, there are some benefits of trees:
1. Trees add beauty our city and improve personal health.  Creating a relaxation and well-being.
2. Trees reduce air pollution, through absorb CO2 and other dangerous gases and, in turn, replenish the atmosphere with oxygen.

There are seven major pollutants and their primary sources:
       POLLUTANT                             MAJOR SOURCES
i     carbon dioxide                     burning oil, coal, natural gas for energy,decay and burning of tropical forests

ii    sulfur dioxide                       burning coal to generate electricity
iii   hydrogen fluoride and          aluminum and phosphate fertilizer production, oil refineries, silicon tetra floride and steel manufacturing
iv  Ozone                                   Chemical reactions of sunlight on automobile exhaust gases.
                                                 Ozone is a major pollutant in smog
v    Methane                               burning fossil fuels, livestock waste, landfills, and rice production
vi  nitrous oxides                       burning fossil fuels and automobile exhausts
vii Chlorofluorocarbon               air conditioners, refrigerators, industrial foam
   
        (“Benefit of Urban Trees”, United States Department of Agriculture Southern Region, page 6)

Trees in the country like Indonesia actually are easy to plant.  Water is abundant, soil are fertile. It is very different with desert country like Saudi Arabia. Trees in several cities are very well maintained. My tour guide in my pilgrimage journey mentioned that if you destroy the trees whether not on purpose, such as an accident, you must pay an expensive penalty (dam) even higher than the price of used car.

So, why do not we plant trees in our small garden, our community area, our neighborhood and our road. You can see the benefit.
   Do you have a dream that all road in your city looks like this?  (Picture taken from Saudi Arabia)

(http://chrispoerwanto.blogspot.com,

http://kotaindonesiaku.blogspot.com)

This entry was posted on Friday, February 1st, 2008 at 12:13 am and is filed under city. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.