Hong Kong authorities are ramping up efforts to handle trees felled by Super Typhoon Ragasa, with two temporary sites set up to process the debris.
The Environmental Protection Department (EPD) said on Thursday that it had designated two locations – Hang Tai Road in Sha Tin and Cheung Fai Road in Tsing Yi – to gather felled trees, as well as to sort and shred tree waste.
Sorted materials are sent to Y Park, the government’s temporary yard waste recycling centre in Tuen Mun, for further processing.
Around 1,200 trees were toppled during Super Typhoon Ragasa last week. The storm, one of the strongest to hit the city, prompted the Hong Kong Observatory to raise the T10 signal – the highest typhoon warning.
Coastal areas such as Tseung Kwan O and Hung Hom were especially hard hit, with hurricane-force winds uprooting large trees.
Felled trees are being transported to the two sites, lent out by the Drainage Services Department and the Highways Department, the EPD said.
“This arrangement helps reduce the distance and time required for departments to transport fallen trees to designated collection points, significantly speeding up their roadside tree clearance process,” the EPD wrote.
“Additionally, the volume of tree debris is greatly reduced after being shredded.”
Tree debris in Hong Kong is usually sent to landfills, while a percentage is brought to the government’s temporary yard waste recycling centre in Tuen Mun.
The government’s handling of typhoon-felled trees came under the spotlight after contractors axed a decades-old banyan tree in Oi Man Estate in Ho Man Tin. The tree, which stood around eight stories tall, was toppled by Ragasa.
The branches and leaves were cut off in the removal process, leaving behind only a stump that was replanted in its original position.
Jim Chi-yung, chair professor at the Education University of Hong Kong’s geography and environmental science department, said the trimming of the branches and leaves could hamper the tree’s regrowth, local media reported.
HK Timberbank, a social enterprise that seeks to salvage tree waste, managed to retrieve some of the debris.
Ricci Wong, founder of HK Timberbank, told HKFP last week he hoped to make furniture out of the wood and bring it back to the estate.
