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Hugsbox 2 days ago [-]
It's slightly annoying that it literally says in the article that he has a photo album showing the growth of the area over time, yet the article chooses to use an AI-generated image at the top instead to depict that. An AI-generated image that looks like shit. What a way to represent this man's incredible accomplishment.
nemo_captain 5 minutes ago [-]
This!!!
I notice it ALL the time. Do people really find it nice to use an AI generated image instead of using a real picture in reporting? Our taste is going down every single day it feels like.
Looks like his real name (da Silva is the most common surname in Brazil) and nominative determinism: "Sun of the Forest". Silvicultura.
I'm trying to get some trees to grow - it's a lot of work: Hélio has spent huge amounts of time and money on it (average wage might be USD1000/month and article says he was spending 7000 a year and if that was in the past then amount is a lot more in today's dollars).
oatmeal1 1 hours ago [-]
I find the idea of planting trees ironic. It would seem to me the better aim would be identifying the issue as to why native plants are not already reproducing successfully, and then fix it. Plants are quite good at reproducing themselves, even if not in the immediate area.
Sha1rholder 24 minutes ago [-]
What do you think botanists and ecologists were doing before large-scale tree planting began?
matherial 54 minutes ago [-]
What? No. Plants colonize new areas in complex succession sequences that require hundreds of years to play out. It might start with grasses, then shrubs, then dense stands of trees that die off and are replaced by stands of other trees... maybe there's a fire that needs to happen in between... and let me remind you that a "city park" is not exactly a natural formation anyway.
If you want a park in 30-50 years, you need to plant trees and design it with specific public-use objectives in mind.
culi 21 minutes ago [-]
Agreed and I think ecological succession is often underappreciated. In secondary succession an ecosystem typically has a deep soil seed bank[0] to draw from. If a plot of land has been ravaged by human development and then abandoned, that may be absent and some human intervention can totally speed things along
Dashrath Manjhi is best known for carving a 110-metre-long (360 ft), 9.1-metre-wide (30 ft), and 7.7-metre-deep (25 ft) path through a ridge of hills using only a hammer and a chisel, because his wife fell and died from injuries due to the ridge blocking easy access to a nearby hospital on time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dashrath_Manjhi
femto 2 hours ago [-]
A similar story to Wendy's Secret Garden in Sydney, Australia?
After her husband's death in 1992, Wendy Whiteley took to cleaning up an unused railway easement behind her house. It turned into a substantial garden. The railways refused to guarantee its future (it was on their land), but in 2015 it became an official park. Well worth a visit on a sunny afternoon if you are in Sydney.
arjie 1 hours ago [-]
There's a children's book that I've been reading to my daughter called The Curious Garden about a boy gardening on abandoned tracks. It's a reference to the High Line, of course, but it's interesting there's more than one like this. I suppose the end of the age of passenger rail in these countries offered opportunities like this.
nl 2 hours ago [-]
I think this is a great story.
For those who aren't aware, that strip of land is probably some of the most valuable residential land on earth.
HK: $200,000+/ sq m (for premium properties on The Peak)
Monoco: $56,000/sq m
Milson's Point (next to Wendy's Secret Garden): $33,000/sq m
Pacific Heights, SF: $22,000/sq m
(According to my/ChattyG's calcs)
femto 1 hours ago [-]
The battle for Wendy's garden will pale into insignificance compared to the battle for a "Sydney Harbour High Line".
In 2023 the NSW government committed to turn the adjacent harbourfront railway line into a public linear park. The next government shredded the agreement and has announced it wants housing everywhere. IMO it's prime land that is too valuable to be privately owned and should be publicly accessible. Anyone who disagrees should go for a harbourfront walk on a sunny afternoon. (Billionaires who's takeaway from the experience would be to buy the land for their own use don't count.)
The same battle played out in Cremorne in the 1890's. Today the park is one of Sydney's jewels.
I notice it ALL the time. Do people really find it nice to use an AI generated image instead of using a real picture in reporting? Our taste is going down every single day it feels like.
Looks like his real name (da Silva is the most common surname in Brazil) and nominative determinism: "Sun of the Forest". Silvicultura.
I'm trying to get some trees to grow - it's a lot of work: Hélio has spent huge amounts of time and money on it (average wage might be USD1000/month and article says he was spending 7000 a year and if that was in the past then amount is a lot more in today's dollars).
If you want a park in 30-50 years, you need to plant trees and design it with specific public-use objectives in mind.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_seed_bank
Dashrath Manjhi is best known for carving a 110-metre-long (360 ft), 9.1-metre-wide (30 ft), and 7.7-metre-deep (25 ft) path through a ridge of hills using only a hammer and a chisel, because his wife fell and died from injuries due to the ridge blocking easy access to a nearby hospital on time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dashrath_Manjhi
https://www.wendyssecretgarden.org.au/
After her husband's death in 1992, Wendy Whiteley took to cleaning up an unused railway easement behind her house. It turned into a substantial garden. The railways refused to guarantee its future (it was on their land), but in 2015 it became an official park. Well worth a visit on a sunny afternoon if you are in Sydney.
For those who aren't aware, that strip of land is probably some of the most valuable residential land on earth.
HK: $200,000+/ sq m (for premium properties on The Peak)
Monoco: $56,000/sq m
Milson's Point (next to Wendy's Secret Garden): $33,000/sq m
Pacific Heights, SF: $22,000/sq m
(According to my/ChattyG's calcs)
https://www.sydneyharbourhighline.org.au/
In 2023 the NSW government committed to turn the adjacent harbourfront railway line into a public linear park. The next government shredded the agreement and has announced it wants housing everywhere. IMO it's prime land that is too valuable to be privately owned and should be publicly accessible. Anyone who disagrees should go for a harbourfront walk on a sunny afternoon. (Billionaires who's takeaway from the experience would be to buy the land for their own use don't count.)
The same battle played out in Cremorne in the 1890's. Today the park is one of Sydney's jewels.
https://www.bonditomanly.com/bondi-to-manly-walk-blog/2020/1...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aY_zuNtf3_g
The ToI article is dated: 2026-08-01
In the article it says:
I Google searched for "Forbes India, in 2003, Helio da Silva" and found the original here: https://www.forbesindia.com/article/lifes/crazy-tree-planter...Date? 2024-09-30
I guess ToI is having summer interns use LLMs to summarise old newspaper articles to produce more AI slop. Yay.