Costa Georgadis says it’s impossible to measure the social and cultural cost of removing a tree as significant in the landscape as an 80-year-old raintree in Cairns.
The much-loved host of ABC TV’s Gardening Australia program met today with concerned residents under the tree’s towering canopy, across the road from a local school.
“Kids cannot be what they cannot see,” Mr Georgadis told ABC Far North breakfast radio.
“If they see massive trees being cut down, we are de-sensitising them to the importance of what they offer,”
“Large trees cannot be replaced with smaller trees to get the same return…. the value of our large trees is priceless.”
Cairns Regional Council has given the green light for the new owner of the land to remove the tree. Its cited an assessment which determined the tree’s roots had caused “major, irreparable structural damage” to an existing dwelling and expert advice that installing root barriers or pruning would risk destabilising the tree.
Objectors have sought a stay of execution for the iconic tree. However, council said once a development approval has been issued the property owner has the right to rely on it and it cannot be rescinded.
But Mr Georgadis said it was incumbent on decision and policy makers to look beyond property boundaries and conventional planning guidelines to enshrine the true value of significant trees to a community.
“No one owns that tree, we all own that tree.
“If we just keep cutting corners, saying ‘oh well, just plant 10 other (trees)’, we are missing the point of what it means to hold values – not just value in real estate and economics – but the heart side of it, culture side of it, the community side of it needs to be valued in the same way.”
Mr Georgadis was invited to visit by the Freshwater Raintree Action Group, which has not ruled out legal action in an 11th hour bid to halt plans to remove the tree.
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