It's an ill wind that blows no good, and the catastrophic gale that felled more than 10,000 trees in France's historic park of Versailles exactly five years ago has indeed had some positive consequences. Despite the devastation caused by the 1999 storm, the park has emerged with more trees than before, as it was the catalyst for speeding up regeneration that had already begun after an earlier storm in 1990.
The storm caused most damage in the parts of the park that were due for replanting anyway, but spared trees that had been planted more recently, according to Pierre-Andre Lablaude, the chief architect for France's historic monuments who is in charge of the park's management. "The trees that were blown down had been planted between 1860 and 1880. They were approaching the end of their lives and they were fragile," Lablaude said.
SINCE 1999, 50,000 NEW TREES HAVE BEEN PLANTED: "That sounds a lot, but you should know that for each tree blown down, five young ones are planted and only one is selected to grow to maturity," Lablaude said. The replanting program is scheduled to continue to 2010 with the felling and replacement of 10,000 more old trees.
The programme has benefited from a 19-million euro (26-million dollar) donation from the state and a further two million euros raised by public subscription. The subscription was organised to channel the "extraordinary spirit of solidarity" after the storm, Lablaude said. Everyone who gave money received details and locations of the trees being planted with the help of their donations. Versailles, which was started by the Sun King Louis XIV 14 kilometers (nine miles) south-west of Paris has been replanted four times during its history.
"Had we wanted to maintain this rhythm, we should have started to replant in 1970," Lablaude said. "Unfortunately this was not done for budgetary reasons and because of ecological sensitivities."
Another positive aspect of the storm is that it allowed planners to put into effect a program of replanting that respects the original design of the park. "We realised that the form of the garden had altered a lot with time," Lablaude said. "We therefore decided to plant slow-growing species that would permit us to have a lower tree cover, and less overshadowed paths corresponding to the configuration of the small park at Versailles as Louis XIV knew it."
The small park is the area immediately surrounding the chateau de Versailles, as opposed to the larger and wilder area that stretches for miles behind the palace.
"We wanted to show the public that the garden is an element of heritage that is just as valuable as the chateau," Lablaude added.
In the English-style gardens of the Petit Trianon and the farm where Marie Antoinette sought relief from the formality of the court, the uprooted trees have been replaced by species, some of them rare, that were in the inventory of Versailles in the 18th century.
Lablaude said the replanting has increased by tenfold the beauty of places that were designed for dreaming.
"The storm was at first seen as a real catastrophe, but in hindsight, we realise that it has given an image of the park that is younger, more gay, less nostalgic of the garden of the past and above all more in keeping with what the sovereigns of the ancien regime were able to know."
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