the glocal Faro wrote an open letter to the City Council asking the municipality to find "solutions to keep as many existing trees as possible" in the future redevelopment of Mata do Liceu.
This movement wants Mata to keep, "at least the same amount of trees as it had before the project."
According to Glocal, in the approved project, although the Chamber of Faro to state “that a large percentage of the trees to be felled are dead, others are marked for felling, despite being healthy”.
According to the Chamber of Faro, the «requalification of the Mata do Liceu presupposes the implementation of a new programmatic occupation of the space, where the sport component, which has characterized the use of the Forest, especially in recent years, would assume a greater preponderance».
«However, and as they recognize, Mata is already used for sports and there are also other spaces in the city dedicated to this practice – the lawns next to Forum Algarve and Parque de S. Francisco, Parque Ribeirinho and the Complexo Municipal Sports of Faro», recalls Glocal.
As for the trees, this movement says that Mata, after the intervention, “will be with less 168: currently there are 981. After the intervention there will be 813, that is, 83% of the initial number”.
“The elimination of 17% of the city's green space is aggravated by the fact that 200 of these 813 trees are now young trees, to be planted during the intervention. The benefits of mature trees, in terms of evapotranspiration, CO2 capture and oxygen availability, are not comparable to those of early life trees, a fact that is aggravated by the need for water that these new trees will require for years. adds yet.
Thus, Glocal concludes that «we will have to wait several years to obtain all the benefits of the trees to be planted in the scope of this intervention. We also found that in the city of Faro the area of urban green structure per / inhabitant represents only 22% of what is desirable and that the execution of the “Requalification of the Mata do Liceu” will further aggravate this situation».
The movement also wants to “find an alternative to the proposed deactivated concrete pavement for the main path, for example using stabilized gravel (a type of material that was used in the paths of Ribeirinho Park) which is more natural and permeable”.
In this letter, Glocal also recalls the Chamber of Faro that “Algarve is the region of the country where the effects of climate change are most felt, namely due to the current situation of severe drought and respective perspectives of aggravation”.
«In this context, the 17% reduction in the forested area of the Forest, the waterproofing of part of the forest through the execution of the accessibility plan, the felling of existing adult trees and the implementation of a lawn will imply an increase in water consumption, in a a time when consumption savings should be maximizing,” he concludes.
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