Mad about trees?

Cycling to London’s Islington this morning to meet a contact, I spotted a man digging a hole next to a truck carrying a load of trees.

I stopped at once and found that he was in the process of planting seven trees on Upper Street. This is a long, reasonably wide shopping and dining street which has haphazard and rather too occasional trees along it.

I think he and his mate thought I was completely mad. I told him he was changing the world and that he should be putting up even more trees in Upper Street.

He told me the council were paying for them and paying him to plant them.

Continuing my journey, I found myself fumbling with the maths. Less than £20 for the maple, less than £2 for the horse manure, and let’s say £10 an hour for the guy digging. A pretty fabulous investment for posterity.

It should be happening all over the country – but isn’t. In fact, with even more of the nation’s streets being dug up for the replacement of Victorian drains and the laying of fibre-optic cables, councils should be compelling the digger uppers to plant a tree every 20 yards they dig.

That’s enough digging from me.