Story Info
Story Info
Panu Pihkala & Sofia Laine
Vallilanlaakso, Helsinki
2023
Type of Wounded Place
Story & Experience
(From Sofia) I have known Vallilanlaakso almost 20 years and enjoyed this solid large natural space with diversity of trees, bushes, a small river and hills. It has been for all these years an important part of my everyday life. I have walked, biked (and once even cross-country skied, after a heavy snowstorm) through it to the office or other activities. I have often also “taken the office outside” and had a picnic together in a spot where nature is now entirely gone and tram tracks are under construction.
My child went to a kindergarten just next to the area that is now a construction site. There is another outdoors daycare center operating next door nowadays. Both centers actively used the green area in their activities with the children – now impossible as these space do not exist anymore.
I strongly feel, through my own and family experiences, that Vallilanlaakso has been very supportive and safe green area for many people, but also to other living beings: for example, there has been a hedgehog community living on the allotment garden area – now threatened by the tram too.
There was a petition to save the valley from building. When that failed, there was a spontaneous grieving area organized for the lost trees by anonymous artists. More than 1000 trees and plants over 2 meters high were cut down. There was a group of local residents hugging trees as a protest movement inspired by the Chipko women who did the same earlier in the history.
Now the trees are gone and the green area cut. The entire ground on the massive construction area has been removed and remade by the city landscape architects.
I have strongly felt this loss: as an irreversible tragedy that takes away a lot of immeasurable everyday wellbeing of the humans and more-than-human-world. The place that used to support and bring joy in the everyday life, the green place I thanked for just being there for everyone, is now a large construction site that I witness with grief, loss and gravity. The loss is not only for humans but for all living, today and the future (also those who have not even born yet and will ever experience the joy, restorativeness, grounding, and safety what the space provided earlier).
(From Sofia) I have known Vallilanlaakso almost 20 years and enjoyed this solid large natural space with diversity of trees, bushes, a small river and hills. It has been for all these years an important part of my everyday life. I have walked, biked (and once even cross-country skied, after a heavy snowstorm) through it to the office or other activities. I have often also “taken the office outside” and had a picnic together in a spot where nature is now entirely gone and tram tracks are under construction.
My child went to a kindergarten just next to the area that is now a construction site. There is another outdoors daycare center operating next door nowadays. Both centers actively used the green area in their activities with the children – now impossible as these space do not exist anymore.
I strongly feel, through my own and family experiences, that Vallilanlaakso has been very supportive and safe green area for many people, but also to other living beings: for example, there has been a hedgehog community living on the allotment garden area – now threatened by the tram too.
There was a petition to save the valley from building. When that failed, there was a spontaneous grieving area organized for the lost trees by anonymous artists. More than 1000 trees and plants over 2 meters high were cut down. There was a group of local residents hugging trees as a protest movement inspired by the Chipko women who did the same earlier in the history.
Now the trees are gone and the green area cut. The entire ground on the massive construction area has been removed and remade by the city landscape architects.
I have strongly felt this loss: as an irreversible tragedy that takes away a lot of immeasurable everyday wellbeing of the humans and more-than-human-world. The place that used to support and bring joy in the everyday life, the green place I thanked for just being there for everyone, is now a large construction site that I witness with grief, loss and gravity. The loss is not only for humans but for all living, today and the future (also those who have not even born yet and will ever experience the joy, restorativeness, grounding, and safety what the space provided earlier).
Why this Place?
Vallilanlaakso, Helsinki
Helsinki has been a quite green city, globally compared. In the 19th and 20th centuries, city planners left many forest and park spaces amidst buildings. Unfortunately, during the last decades, these green spaces have become increasingly threatened by city development.
We held the first Finnish Earth Exchange in a small valley called Vallilanlaakso; Vallila is the name of the district and “laakso” means valley in Finnish. Located between the highly populated district of Pasila and other rapidly growing districts in its surroundings, the valley has been an important breathing space for lots of people and other creatures. After a long political fight, it was decided to build a tram line across the valley, cutting it in half and destroying much of its character. All this to save 7-10 minutes travel time.
We have a network of Radjoy-minded people called Rihmasto in Helsinki. Some of our members have lived close to Vallilanlaakso for years, especially Sofia, so this was an exceptionally important event for her. She tells below of the place and her connections with it.
Act of Beauty
Say more about your actions and activity
In the Earth Exchange, we first spent time with the destroyed parts of the place. This included reading green canvases marshalled by the city to greenwash the operation with nature-related thoughts from high school students in Helsinki. Luckily, some of the students had managed to include socio-environmental criticism in their comments. We then found a safe spot near the borders of the construction area, under an old coniferous tree (lehtikuusi, larix), on which somebody had hanged a sign – similar to the ones on the grieving area for the lost trees that appeared half-an-year earlier to a nearby spot now totally transformed. This sign quoted the poet Kahlil Gibran: “Trees are poems the earth writes upon the sky”.
We told stories of what the place meant for us and others, we collected materials from the environs, and we built a RadJoy bird to commemorate the place. The art bird had elements both from the construction site and from the “still green area” – half vital, half dead (pine cones on the death side symbolizing e.g. hope and potential). An organic bird was found dead close to the ritual site and was carried to rest under the wing of the larger “Earth Exchange” art bird.
Rituals in an open public space can also be witnessed as changes in energy settings of that specific area. This time too our small ritual generated observable changes: We witnessed grounding, kindness, love and life increasing among the humans and more-than-human-world – opening wider spaces for hope, faith and vitality.
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