Canada/The City of Rimouski wants to plant 1000 trees a year

The City of Rimouski adopted its very first tree policy on Monday evening. The main objective is to increase the vegetation cover of the urban canopy by planting 10,000 trees by 2035. For the moment, however, there is nothing to protect the urban woodlands targeted by housing development from destruction.

Rimouski is hardly a pioneer in this field. A city like Matane, for example, developed one 17 years ago! Rivière-du-Loup adopted its own in 2021. Nonetheless, Rimouski has set itself a specific objective to catch up: to increase the urban canopy by 6% in 10 years.

The aim is to increase the canopy index, i.e. the extent of the urban perimeter covered by the crown of trees, from 25.3% to 26.8%.

A goal that some might call modest, but Mayor Guy Caron is realistic.

We want to plant trees that will survive, so we're talking about trees that will cost around $400 to $500 each.

A quote from Guy Caron, Mayor of Rimouski

Currently, the city plants an average of 150 trees a year. The commitment to plant almost seven times as many is therefore not insignificant, according to municipal authorities.

Rimouski's share of urban greenery has shrunk by almost 20 percentage points since 2000, a greater decline than in the whole of Quebec. The city intends to reverse this trend.

Around 30% of the 10,000 new trees will replace trees that have been cut down either because they are diseased or to make way for development.

In fact, 7,000 trees will be added to the city's urban territory.

If nothing is done, the city estimates that 50 hectares of canopy will be lost by 2035.

Urban woodlands still under threat

For the time being, at least, the tree policy has not been accompanied by any regulatory changes to protect urban woodlands targeted for housing development from destruction.

However, the mayor speaks of an additional sensitivity in favor of conservation. This will be studied on a case-by-case basis, but these woodlands will no longer be considered solely from the point of view of development, but also in terms of their impact on the city's canopy development objectives.

The City could, however, modify its bylaws to allow it to achieve the goal of increasing the urban canopy by 6%, but it's too early to say.

Our first action this fall will be to create a new position for a forestry specialist who will be responsible for implementing actions to achieve our objective," adds Claire Lafrance, Environment Division Manager for the City of Rimouski.

The city has set aside $1.4 million between 2026 and 2029 to implement the tree policy. Other sums will be added later.

The development of this policy has also shown that trees are in good health on the city's territory.

Source: ici.radio-canada.ca/