Vilnius municipality, business, and public representatives have agreed that trees in a small green space in central Vilnius will not be cut down for now.
Plans by developers to cut down nine trees on Romain Gary Square on the corner of Basanavičiaus Street and Mindaugo Street outraged Vilnius residents last week. On Wednesday, several hundred people staged a protest in support of preserving the trees.
Plans to cut down the mature trees have been put on hold for now, according to Adomas Bužinskas, head of the Vilnius Municipality Administration.
“The owners of the premises, as well as representatives of the public initiative groups and the municipality sat down. We agreed that as long as the investigations are being carried out by the General Prosecutor’s Office, the municipality, and the Department of Cultural Heritage, nothing will be done with the trees in the area,” Bužinskas told the 15min news website on Saturday.
According to him, a group of public representatives would be allowed to carry out an independent expert examination of the condition of the trees.
“And this public-initiated examination will answer the question of whether these trees can continue to be there or not,” he said.
However, no specific time for the expert examination has been agreed upon yet.
“The scope of work to be carried out during the expert examination is quite large and the café that is operating there would lose the rest of the summer season. We have agreed that we will negotiate with the café, the owners of the premises, and the public group the best time to carry out the expertise,” Bužinskas explained.
The terrace square is part of the historic Railway Administration building. On it, developers plan to construct a glass and steel structure to expand a nearby cafe, placing seven plant pots instead of the nine mature trees.
He also noted that the municipality had appealed to the Prosecutor General’s Office about the development permit on the square. In addition, the municipality is also carrying out its own internal check on the permit.
According to the Vilnius City Municipality, it did not agree with the company’s request to cut down the trees but the Vilnius Regional Administrative Court confirmed the company’s right to re-apply to have the trees removed.
Vilnius Mayor Valdas Benkunskas has admitted that there are no legal measures to preserve the trees, so the municipality will seek to have the trees recognised as an object of cultural heritage. According to Benkunskas, Culture Minister Simonas Kairys has already contacted the Department of Cultural Heritage about this.
The Vilnius mayor has also asked the Prosecutor’s Office to investigate the public interest in the case of the entrepreneurs’ plans to cut down the trees on Romain Gary Square.
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