Dao shalt not cut heritage trees
July 24, 2004 | 12:00am
One of my favorite day-trip destinations south of Manila is Los Baños, specifically the University of the Philippines campus. I went to school at Diliman and although that place was clean and green in the 1970s, UPLB still felt more probinsya and closer to nature. This has not changed to this day, but the place is continually being threatened by encroaching urbanization. This threat used to be just from the outside with fast food joints and karaoke parlors knocking at the gates. Unfortunately, the threats now come from inside, too, with pressure to remove a half-century-old tree, one of the most prominent on a campus whose main character is the primacy of nature over human architecture.
The University of the Philippines at Los Baños was one of two original campuses of the university. The Padre Faura and Los Baños campuses will soon celebrate their centennials. It is important to make sure that the legacy of its campuses, as well as the quality of education given, be conserved and sustained for another century, which is the minimum amount of time we need to get out of our national economic and social rut, unless of course we stop monkeying around with debilitating politics.
The monkeys and crocodiles in Makiling are fewer than a hundred years ago, but the place, along with the national reserve on Mount Makiling, still contains the only relatively untouched swatches of tropical forest within SUV distance of Manila. I remember being able to motor down in 45 minutes from Diliman with my college barkada just to have lunch, stroll around the campus and come home with bottles of fresh milk or that funky soy drink they used to bottle over there. It takes much longer to get there now, but the milk is still fresh and the campus landscape more verdant every time I visit.
The campus itself was a small, scattered complex of American colonial-era buildings before the war. Many of these remain and give the place additional character. Most of what is seen today was built in the 1960s and 1970s as we strove – and did for a while – to be the leader in agricultural technology and education. The master plan was redrawn in the early 1960s by Harvard—trained planner Angel Nalpil. Most of the newer buildings were designed by the top architects of the day: Carlos Arguelles, Felipe Mendoza and National Artist for Architecture Leandro Locsin.
All these designers made sure that the campus retained as much of its characteristic vegetation as possible. One of the most memorable buildings on the campus is Locsin’s University Student Union. This is a prime example of Lindy’s brutalist phase of design, but despite this, the structure worked well and endeared itself to generations of students. Locsin had made sure that the structure would preserve a stately Dao tree that grew nearby. It is this tree that serves as a vertical counterpoint to the building’s horizontality and frames it aesthetically as one of the postcard views of the campus. The tree is threatened today as school authorities have earmarked it for cutting.
The news that this beloved Dao was to be cut sparked an outrage from conservationists, led by Dr. Perry Ong and several batches of alumni, who have sent word by snail mail and cyber message. The problem seems to have started when employees at the union noticed that the tree was leaning. Some alarm was raised as previous years’ typhoons have sent large trees crashing down houses in a residential area nearby.
The Dao (Dracontomelon dao) is one of the country’s threatened forest species, according to the 1980 International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red Data Guide Book. It is a tall tree used to make furniture, boats, crates and match sticks. It grows to a height that reaches 40 meters (about 12 storeys) and adds in no small measure to the diversity of Philippine forests and its physical robustness as a habitat for tropical flora and fauna. To lose the Dao would be to lose a part of our forest’s soul.
Since the concern about this particular tree was raised, Dr. Eugenia Castillo, UPLB dean of student affairs, asked the UPLB College of Forestry and Natural Resources to look at the tree. The UPLB-CFNR dean recommended that the tree be cut. However, Environment and Natural Resources Secretary Elisea Gozun stepped in, following requests from concerned students, professors and alumni. Gozun had the UPLB-based DENR-Ecosystems Research and Development Bureau and the Los Baños Community Environment and Natural Resources Office (CENRO) do another study, which pointed to the fact that the tree could still be saved.
The recommendations were to trim the tree to reduce the risks of it falling, to construct a prop to strengthen the tree and additional rehabilitation measures to rectify any decay reported at the base of the tree. In short, it is possible to save this natural heritage while making sure that safety to pedestrians is not compromised.
A campus’ or a city’s landscape is not a stagnant element like a building. Landscapes take time to mature, and when mature, needs to be maintained to ensure its function and beauty. Long-term planning, maintenance and sustainability are concepts Filipinos still have to absorb and implement. We seem to have forgotten that respect for the processes and products of nature was one of our original traits and ensured ours and our descendants’ health and prosperity.
I do not know whose decision will finally be followed at the UPLB, and if we will lose another bit of our natural heritage next week. We will be all the more impoverished if this happens. We need to look at individual trees as well as the whole forest to understand just what is at stake. Finally, for planners and architects, the development of future campuses must take into account long-term goals of both the built structures, as well as the landscape design. Landscape architects should be given the opportunity to contribute to campus planning as members of a multi-disciplinary team. This, to ensure that users and visitors reap the benefit of good architecture as well as the best setting of green spaces, clean air, picturesque vistas – all framed by majestic God-made trees.
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