At night they move, great shadows on the march,
Positioning themselves at bends in roads,
Traipsing across fields to find the most dangerous spots
Where they can stand waiting, waving their branches,
Ready to hurl themselves forward implacably at passing motorists
Too drink-sodden or speed-crazed to care.
But now the Anti-Plane-Tree-Commandos have arrived!
Heroes of this desperate hour,
Chainsaws buzzing,
Oblivious to danger,
They stalk the terrorist trees!
Hurrah! To the Anti-Plane-Tree-Commandos!
Hurrah! To the breweries!
Hurray! To high speed!
Death to the Plane Trees!
From The Independent
Friday, 10 August 2001
By dead of night this week, a group calling itself the Anti-Plane Tree Commando sawed down 66 trees on a minor road in the foothills of the Pyrenees. The same group, believed to consist of local motorcyclists armed with power saws, destroyed 96 plane trees on another stretch of the same road, just north of Tarbes, in June.
According to one survey, nearly one in 10 of the 8,000 road deaths in France each year involves collisions with trees.
In a letter sent to a local radio station this week, the Anti-Plane Tree Commando said it had been forced to put pressure on the government, because “things have not advanced since June”. The same letter called on people all over France to take chainsaws into their own hands.
Arguments over the compatibility of such trees with motor vehicles are not new. President Georges Pompidou – traditionally seen as a friend of the car – wrote to his Prime Minister, Jacques Chaban-Delmas, in 1970, opposing the suppression of roadside trees. “France does not exist solely for people to drive around in cars,” he wrote. “The requirements of road safety should not disfigure the French countryside.”
And the poet, Raymond Queneau, wrote at about the same time: “Plane trees no longer grow beside the road. They have emigrated to calmer places. They have had enough of cars hitting them in their trunks at full speed. They have had enough of hearing all the ladies and gentlemen accuse them of being responsible for all life’s dramas.”
