The Metropolis

Science wants London to plant Christmas trees

Mike Pollitt | Thursday 27 October, 2011 13:08

The news that trees are good will come as no surprise to anyone who stayed awake in Year 8 Biology.

A paper published this month in the journal Landscape and Urban Planning indicates that the urban trees of the Greater London Authority (GLA) area remove somewhere between 850 and 2000 tonnes of particulate pollution (PM10) from the air every year.

So we should plant more trees, simple. But which sort? And where?

The research found that the targeting of tree planting in the most polluted areas of the GLA area and particularly the use of a mixture of trees, including evergreens such as pines and evergreen oak, would have the greatest benefit to future air quality in terms of PM10 removal.

I fail to see how anyone could object to an enormous Christmas tree being planted in the middle of every roundabout in the city. They would suck up pollution all year, and to reciprocate we could decorate them at Christmas in a pagan ceremony of thanks. Win win.

Source: EurekAlert! via Atlantic Cities
Photo: Wikipedia

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