Coimbatore: Heavy rain and high winds uprooted as many as 65 trees along roads in the city and outskirts in the last two weeks. Botanists are blaming bad road engineering for the loss of green cover.
A minimum of one square foot area should be left around trees to allow water to percolate and to ensure that roots do not weaken, experts said. But, this does not happen due to indiscriminate construction of roads and stormwater drains. Moreover, roots are often chopped off during works.
Associate Botany professor at Madras Christian College D Narasimhan said several factors lead to uprooting. “Paver blocks and tar laid around trees weaken roots. Bad engineering is definitely one of the major factors that lead to the fall of trees. While older trees penetrate deep into soil and manage to survive, whenever roads are dug up or drains are laid, roots are chopped off, leading to uprooting,” he told TOI. “There should be scientific planting of trees. Even the method in which the trees are planted also becomes a factor,” Narasimhan said.
Experts from the Forest College and Research Institute had suggested tree species that can withstand heavy wind and rain to be planted along roads. Species such as Indian bael (Aegle marmelos), alanji (Alangium salviifolium), bitter albizia (Albizia amara), flea tree (Albizia lebbeck) and palasam (Butea monosperma) can be planted along the roads.
Narasimhan said that the government is slowly trying to replace the existing tree species with those that can withstand the weather. “Apart from just planting specific species, tree maintenance also requires attention. Regular pruning, checking bark for infections and shallow rooting should be done,” he said.
City corporation officials said that they regularly prune branches and ensure that trees that pose risk to commuters are removed. “At some locations, roads are not very wide and it becomes impossible to provide the required space around the trees,” said an official.
Scientists at the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University’s Agro Climate Research Centre said the wind speed was around 10-12km per hour in the last few days and it will increase in the coming days. “It is likely to rain for another three days. Wind velocity will also increase. We have issued warnings to farmers as well,” centre head S Panneerselvam said.
Meanwhile, S Syed of environmental NGO Osai said that invasive species are more vulnerable to uprooting.