Green cover for Vizag

The promise of trees everywhere

If we go by what we hear in the papers, Vizag will have millions of trees planted by the end of this monsoon period. That will be quite amazing in the long run. In around 10 years time it will help reduce air borne pollution, improve precipitation and hopefully get more rainfall, improve groundwater retention and drop the ambient temperature in the city by at least 2 degrees centigrade. 

A couple of winters ago I recollect walking from Dwarakanagar to Dabagardens. As I crossed the old jail area which still has a few old trees standing I could sense the temperature drop suddenly. God bless these wonderful large trees and God save us from misguided developers who would rather cut these trees down and build a mall there.

VUDA's miserable green track record

In the past our local administration has failed miserably in maintaining Vizag's green cover. As is clear from any Google satellite image of Vizag, almost all the greenery in Vizag is only within compounds such as Railways, Andhra University, HPCL Quarters, Harbour Park, Varuna Park,  INS Kalinga  etc. A huge mass of greenery is that of forest lands and Simahchalam hills. The rest of the greenery is within the compounds of private residences. I recollect our previous VUDA chairman Mr. Vishnu once saying in a public place that Vizag had a large percentage of green cover, he forgot to mention that this was in spite of VUDA and not because of it. Take a look at the entire beach road, not a single tree has been planted there. The bottom line is that very little greenery exists in public areas under GVMC/VUDA. Under the circumstances we can surmise that any land getting transferred from private to public entities will lose its green cover instantly. 

Green cover mostly in colonies and compounds

The Pole & Tree Ratio

During the 1980s Pandurangapuram, where I live, was a very green area with plenty of avenue trees. Subsequently many trees were cut for road widening and building construction. Now there are hardly any avenue trees in the area. The irony is that in the short stretch of around 700 meters between AIR Junction to Spencer there are more than 110 poles on the road sides but less than 6 trees! 

Poles poles and more poles

Several of the poles are not connected to any wires at all. Many of the poles have only one strand of thin cable. Some  of the poles are tilted and bent. TV Cables are cut and hanging dangerously from many poles. We cannot even know which is an electricity carrying cable and which is not. The electrical poles are plastered with posters and even the pole number is not visible in case we want to make a complaint. Ever so often trees are cut because the branches interfere with the wires above.

The solution is evident. We must remove all the underused and unused poles, and plant thousands of avenue trees. GVMC, the co-opted industries and Shri. Subbarami Reddy the "architect" of this initiative are on the right track. I am optimistic but am not holding my breath.