Last week, residents of Quebec were surprised to see the machinery disembark and watched helplessly as almost all the trees were felled behind their homes. A promoter had acquired land for subdivision purposes and, authorization in hand, the time had come to destroy a natural environment. The elected officials reacted, but the case is not over. The regulations on the massive felling of trees are back on the table.
I am sensitive to what the residents of the Les Saules district, located near the Technological Park, experience. Sensitive for two reasons: first, because the impacts of the destruction of natural environments on health, physical and mental, are known. Indeed, the loss of a place that is dear to us causes solastalgia, which Glenn Albrecht defines as “the existential experience of a negative environmental change, felt as an assault on our sense of belonging to a place. It is a chronic disorder created by a feeling of distress or desolation”.
I am also sensitive to it because it is always the same story that is played out in the big cities of Quebec. I will summarize this story and allow myself, in conclusion, to draw a lesson from it.
The birth of woodlands can be explained quite easily. It comes from the fact that a city cannot transform its urbanization perimeter all at once, once and for all. It will do so over time, depending on constraints and possibilities. In this, development is done more by throwing dice than by integrated planning. It is this development, which is always irregular, that creates the “urban woodlands”.
There are thus several accidental reasons which explain why there are still here and there “non-deforested” sectors: physical constraints make a site unbuildable, infrastructures are absent, a promoter is awaiting authorization (or change zoning), land is subject to financial speculation, the City’s urban plan is not completed, etc. As a general rule, the presence of woodlands is therefore not the result of sustainable land development that would take into account their ecological value, citizen ownership or their role in mitigating the effects of the climate crisis.
Isolated forest remnants, woodlands are found in the four corners of the city. These are natural environments — and not green spaces — to which residents have become attached and which serve as attractions for other people who choose to settle nearby. Over time, citizens will appropriate the last natural environment in the neighborhood to walk their dog or practice ornithology, botany, forest bathing or snowshoeing. In places, citizens will maintain trails. These places are a delight for the community and biodiversity!
Then, inevitably, after several years of enjoying the birdsong, citizens will learn that the pretty wooded area belonged to a developer, a senator, that the City was planning the extension of a neighborhood (residential or industrial) or that a road extension was in the cards. Citizens will be faced with a fait accompli, at least most often. It’s because the planning team had remained discreet until a notice of motion fell to the municipal council, an authorization was granted, the media lifted a corner of the veil or the machinery arrived.
Some citizens will seek to defend the wooded area from the clutches of development blind to the needs of the community. If they do it early enough, they may succeed in raising awareness among neighbours, elected officials, an MP or environmental groups, but it is likely that this cause heard will not interest anyone – at least after the passage of the media. . This is how urban woodlands die and biodiversity declines.
The short story illustrates that this type of development has negative impacts on citizens. Without seeking to feed cynicism, it illustrates that the massive felling of trees takes advantage of a problem of access to information and that there is often an issue of public interest behind an apparently private affair. Now, let us ask ourselves: why is it always like this? In my opinion, it is a problem of sustainable development of the territory linked to a democratic deficit. Rather than setting aside large forested areas to ensure that the canopy is distributed over the entire territory, offering these areas a conservation designation or limiting uses to protect the common natural heritage, development is allowed to precede the needs of the community.
In conclusion, why not draw a lesson from this for the future? During a consultation launched by the former administration, I asked that the regulations on the massive felling of trees be reviewed so that the urban forest is recognized as a common natural heritage. I proposed the following: “Although each slaughter context differs, it must be recognized that citizens are too often placed before a fait accompli […]. This is why we recommend that the obligation to make public any authorization to fell trees in public or private property be added to the normative provisions. »
Since I have confidence in our elected officials and the time has come to review the regulations, I take the liberty of reiterating my proposal. If it is not easy to develop the city without cutting down trees, it must be possible to obtain the necessary social acceptability before doing so.