London Mayor Boris Johnson defends tree planting policy (From Your Local Guardian)

London Mayor Boris Johnson defends tree planting policy

6:30am Thursday 19th November 2009 in

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Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has defended his tree policy after it was revealed Transport for London (TfL) had reduced the number of trees on its road network by 328 last year.

The Mayor has pledged to plant 10,000 new trees on streets by 2012 and said it was not always possible to replace felled trees “due to inadequate underground conditions, the presence of utilities or in circumstances where the tree has grown from seed in an unsafe location”.

But Green Party and London Assembly member, Darren Johnson, who obtained the figures, said: “The data provided by the Mayor has shown that on his own Transport for London controlled roads more trees are being removed than are being planted. This is pretty outrageous and in stark contrast to the hype we have seen from Boris Johnson about planting more trees.”

At Mayor’s Questions last month Mr Johnson said he had pledged £4m over four years for 10,000 new street trees in the neediest areas and was supporting programmes to raise funds for tree planting projects.

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