Tune in here to a great podcast conversation from 2SER-FM with our own Bruce Knobloch discussing the Rethinking the Urban Forest Conference at Addison Road Community Centre on Friday 24th May: “Any urban area is a disrupted ecosystem and that has impacts on temperature… on bi-diversity, and human health,” Bruce told Julia Carr-Catzel of 2SER-FM’s ‘Weekend Breakfast’ show.

“People might know about the urban heat island effect [for example]. This is where lack of green cover, lack of canopy, lack of grass as well – but especially trees being replaced by roads, rooves and pavement means that the temperature in that part of the city, especially in summer, is so much greater than it would be without all of that built infrastructure. And that has a massive impact on human health and the climate disruption emergency.”

Rethinking the Urban Forest is a response to such issues and so much more. Dealing in theory and practice, it brings together academics, policy makers, arborists, politicians, environmentalists and community groups to examine how we live and work with nature in the urban environment.

“It’s a cross-disciplinary conference that really grew out of the on-site experience and ways of working of Addison Road Community Centre Organisation,” Bruce explained to 2SER-FM. From creating and studying a ‘habitat tree’ at the Centre that provides a necessary home to birds and lizards, to looking at how trees across the inner west protect us from the sun, enrich our mental and phsyical lives, and how they off-set pollution, the Addison Road Community Centre Organisation has steadily observed how true it is that ‘from little things big things grow’. Rethinking the Urban Forest arrives out of this ‘act local, think global’ feeling.

Please take a listen to this important conversation in favour of a greener and better city – and how we can develop approaches to make that happen here and elsewhere. And do come along to Rethinking the Urban Forest on Friday May 24th! A special thanks to 2SER-FM producer Fabian Veron and host Julia Carr-Catzel for inviting Bruce Knobloch on to ‘Weekend Breakfast’ .

Julia Carr-Catzel, the host of 2SER-FM’s Weekend Breakfast. Photo by Bruce Knobloch.