Cities today are turning into concrete jungles with high-rise buildings and urbanization taking over the green spots. Hence, taking cognizance of the shrinking green spaces in the city, Chennai Corporation came up with an innovative idea.
A 23,000-square-foot land area outside Kotturpuram railway station in Chennai was filled with construction debris and household waste eight-months-ago. But if you visit the place now, you’ll be surprised to see how the dump yard, in the heart of the city, has turned into a forest. The authorities adopted the Japanese method of tree plantation called Miyawaki to restore the encroached land in Canal Bank road, reported The New Indian Express.
You give a chance and the nature will amaze you.
An 8 month old Miyawaki forest in Kotturpuram. #Change pic.twitter.com/DjGTqmienn
— Dr Alby John (@albyjohnV) October 2, 2020
For the uninitiated, Miyawaki style of plantation was introduced by Japanese botanist Akita Miyawaki in the 80’s. The method aims at reforestation of a focused area. The civic body planted a total of 2,020 trees of about 40 varieties that are now home to several unique species of birds.
Many hanks to dedicated maintenance by the zonal teams & guidance of various NGO's ; all forests are growing good.
Thank u for reading and will try to keep this thread updated with further pics in future.
#UrbanForest #Greenspaces pic.twitter.com/3crVYK121R— Dr Alby John (@albyjohnV) October 2, 2020
This isn’t the first Miyawaki-style forest planted in the city by the authorities. They also planted another one at Valasaravakkam.
This is a video from the Valasaravakkam Urban Forest. A little old though. 2 months may be. pic.twitter.com/3aIBtTzMY6
— Dr Alby John (@albyjohnV) October 2, 2020
Thank you for the wonderful response.
Sharing a few more pics and videos of other Miyawaki forests.
We have planted 3 #Miyawaki Forests till date.
2 more to be done in this month.#ForNature #UrbanForests https://t.co/OhZJg14hZn— Dr Alby John (@albyjohnV) October 2, 2020
Alby John Varghese, Regional Deputy Commissioner (South) of the Chennai Corporation, said, “The whole land area used to be an eye-sore with various debris and garbage. The Miyawaki method has shown good results and the civic body is set to plant trees in the same method in three more locations in the city.”
Many hanks to dedicated maintenance by the zonal teams & guidance of various NGO's ; all forests are growing good.
Thank u for reading and will try to keep this thread updated with further pics in future.
#UrbanForest #Greenspaces pic.twitter.com/3crVYK121R— Dr Alby John (@albyjohnV) October 2, 2020
This is how people online reacted to the transformation of the garbage-laden land into a lush green forest.
This is extremely impressive & glad govt officials are using miyawaki forest technique
We need this to be implemented in many more places -sidewalks,big roundana, corporation parks, river/water canal sides, encourage Private buildings to implement same. O2/Co2 lungs these trees
— Nathan SP (நாதன்) (@nathan_sp21) October 2, 2020
Excellent work done by Corporation – It was an eyesore before and now looks Green and Lush. Hope similar activities are done elsewhere – on the banks of Adyar river??
— Chandra Prabhakar (@cpas2015) October 2, 2020
Excellent transformation sir !
— PRIYA RAM (@PRIYACHAN) October 2, 2020
A dumping hard to Miyawaki forest. Wonderful transformation.
— 🇮🇳 Vidyasagar Jagadeesan 🇮🇳 (@jvidyasagar) October 2, 2020
Superb sir excellent work 👌
— ஜெய் (@rasan15) October 2, 2020
Wow! Amazing. Too good.
— Sivaraman.N (@swamynext) October 2, 2020
Kudos to the authorities for adopting this technique and gifting the residents this green area that is both soothing to the eyes and the lungs.