PM: Plant fruit trees to make our cities sweeter
TWO million trees could be planted on the streets of towns and cities under Boris Johnson’s plan to brighten up Britain.
And orchards should be introduced in urban areas to ‘ reconnect children with nature’, a Governmentcommissioned review said.
It called for every house to have access to a fruit tree – with one planted for each home built.
The report also said new houses should be fitted with special bricks to encourage birds and bees to settle in urban areas. And it said high streets must be encouraged to become more resilient by welcoming independent retailers. Town halls should fine the owners of empty shops.
The ideas are contained in the Living in Beauty report by the late philosopher Sir Roger
Scruton and his successor as chairman of the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission, Nicholas Boys Smith.
It calls for a new ‘fast track for beauty’ to allow visually pleasing homes to get through the planning process more quickly. The report also recommended using images of buildings to prescribe the types that are acceptable in each area, rather than relying solely on written rules.
Mr Boys Smith said: ‘Most new developments in this country are mediocre or poor. All around us we see ugly and unadaptable buildings, decaying neighbourhoods and new estates. We are scarring our country.’
Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick said well-designed, high quality homes and tree-lined streets should be the ‘norm, not the exception’. He added: ‘I am interested in the proposal of a “fast track for beauty”. Where individuals and developers have put in the time to create proposals for well designed buildings, which use high-quality-materials and take account of their local setting, it can’t be right their planning applications are held up.
‘I too want to see a return to planting more trees. We set out in our manifesto that we will expect all new streets to be lined with trees and are working to make this commitment a reality.
‘I am determined to do all I can to help achieve the goal you’ve set in the report’s conclusion – that we should aspire to pass on our heritage, the best of who we are and what we have, to our successors, not depleted but enhanced.’
Mr Jenrick added that the Daily Mail’s Be A Tree Angel campaign – which has urged readers to plant trees led businesses to pledge money towards orchards for schools – has been ‘pivotal in getting more trees planted across the country’.
The report contains more than 130 practical recommendations. These range from opening old canals to planting urban orchards.
It said: ‘There is a need to reconnect children with nature and with the sources of their food. The Government should support a programme of urban orchards within our towns and cities; encourage local councils to require one fruit tree per new house built; and encourage housebuilders to plant one fruit tree per house.’
It means new homes would be provided with a fruit tree either in the garden or nearby. The report said the planting of the two million street trees would be funded partly through public health budgets.