Pampanga road-widening project to cut 248 trees

CITY OF SAN FERNANDO—The Department of Public works and Highways (DPWH) will cut 248 trees in Floridablanca town in Pampanga province for a P27.9-million road-widening project.

Residents, however, have started a campaign to gather signatures, hoping to save the trees. The signatures would be attached to an appeal to the town council so the trees, along the San Antonio-Floridablanca Road, would be spared.

Nomer Canlas, head of the DPWH Pampanga second district engineering office, said the agency has obtained a permit from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) to cut the trees to improve the shoulders and build drainage canals on a 2-kilometer stretch of the road.

Canlas said the shoulders could be used as lanes for bicycles and tricycles.

But the DPWH has encouraged its contractor to earth-ball the trees instead and transfer these to Pradera, a 315-hectare resort that has given refuge to 400 trees uprooted from MacArthur Highway in Pampanga and Roman Highway in Bataan province.

The permit required the DPWH to replace each tree with 100 seedlings to be planted in forests, Canlas said.

Adolf Pangilinan, council member of Barangay Solib in Floridablanca, said the campaign has gathered 1,000 signatures mostly from students, elderly, traders and farmers.

“The trees, mostly acacia, are more than 50 years old.

“Amid climate change and worsening floods, the DPWH is opting to cut trees. We hope the agency and even the DENR would stop killing trees,” he said. Tonette Orejas, Inquirer Central Luzon