Lyubov Yakubovskaya, employee of the Wildlife Conservation Fund
Huge budget money, earned by all of Russia and accumulated in the capital, is being spent by the city authorities on the destruction of Moscow's natural wealth. The Moscow government brushed aside the expert opinion that leading environmental organizations expressed in a collective appeal on the so-called "park improvement", and raised questions about the improvement to the general public in the frank hope of the low level of environmental literacy of the townspeople.
Now on the platform "Active Citizen" are voting on the improvement of the Bitsevsky forest, the Pokrovskoe-Streshnevo park, the floodplain of the Yauza river. There are obvious manipulative techniques in the polls. For example, it says. about a kind of "ecological ring" of recreational areas. The authors of the survey expect that the townspeople will “buy” the beautiful word “environmentally friendly”, while, in fact, this means the expansion of the recreation area due to the destruction of the natural zone. At the same time, voting on the "Active Citizen" is essentially the only form of dialogue between the city authorities and society. The discussion of funding for the so-called park improvement is taking place without the participation of the representative government. Municipal deputies were excluded from this process, and deputies of the city Duma were asked to simply vote for the final amount of the budget without discussing the measures that make up this amount. For Muscovites who want to consciously approach voting on the issue of preserving the natural complex of the capital and understand how to avoid linguistic traps in the survey, I would like to offer a point of view on the problem from a recognized authority - an expert on Moscow nature, an expert at the Center for Wildlife Conservation, a leading researcher at the Biological Faculty Moscow State University Ksenia Vsevolodovna Avilova :
“The Moscow budget has allocated 28 billion rubles for the improvement of parks for three years. This is 21 times less than their content. After the outrage
specialists and the public, the problem was brought up on the portal "Active Citizen" as a debatable one - is the improvement preferable? In such a formulation of the question, one can clearly see deceit: that many territories have a protected status by law, and many have more than one - a "specially protected natural area" and "an object of cultural heritage", which strictly regulate interference in their appearance and condition, to the survey participants not reported.
At the same time, the proposed improvement not only radically changes the appearance and state of landscapes, which is a gross violation of the laws of the Russian Federation and Moscow, but also leads to a violation of the constitutional right of Muscovites to a favorable environment. Liquidation of every 50 sq. m of vegetation makes it impossible to use their healing effect (microclimatic, purifying, psychotherapeutic) for one Muscovite. Calculate how many people will be deprived of a supportive environment after completing the beautification. Precisely favorable, ensuring the normal process of life, as the same Law on Environmental Protection says, and not "comfortable", which everyone interprets in their own way. That the healing effect is associated with the state of natural areas and with all their components, even at first glance useless, was proved by physicians who discovered experimentally that from staying 20-45 minutes a day in the forest, where, among other natural services, he can listen to birdsong , the number of people suffering from hypertension, as well as the cost of their treatment, are reduced by 26% or to 27.5 million rubles. in year.
One of the most "cosmetic" types of landscaping - regular grass mowing, which, despite the official ban, is widely practiced in protected areas, 12-13 million rubles are spent in only two territories, which could go for treatment during the year for about 1,700 people with cardiac - vascular diseases. And what does the bird have to do with it? And despite the fact that the majority of songbirds, including the nightingales that have recently been numerous in Moscow, helping people to lead a healthy lifestyle, absolutely cannot stand the mowing of grass on the edges and in the groves where they live. And over the years of improvement, the number of nightingales in Moscow has decreased by 30%. What is not indifferent to our health. Of course, the improvement of our natural areas would seem like child's play,
if it was only associated with haymaking. Much more serious injuries are expected to be inflicted on nature - with the replacement of the soil cover with hard surfaces of many kilometers of roads and the installation of countless lanterns, the digging of rain sewers unnecessary in the forest and the installation of hundreds of enclosures for small animals (why?) It is difficult to hope for the preservation of natural balance to the extent that could to compensate for the increasing urban stress.
To top off all the misfortunes, this very improvement has been entrusted to the Moscow Department of Overhaul, a department that does not understand anything in ecology and is not going to listen to anyone. The rout, which was carried out during the improvement of the recently quiet and calm green corners, horrified the inhabitants of the surrounding quarters. You will be surprised that a considerable part of the funds for the next pogroms of nature will be taken from the program ... "Capital Health".
The improvement epidemic has gripped Moscow and is spreading ever wider, and fighting it is as difficult as the epidemic of a new coronavirus infection.