Long Hot Summer

Well, we’ve had several warm days on the trot so I guess that counts as summer. Rain and cooler temperatures forecast from tomorrow so just the stifling heat of this evening to endure.
I was getting fed up with slowly cooking in the house (despite all the doors and windows being open) so went out to drive around in the car with the air con turned up to maximum.
A timely photo posted on FB by a friend prompted me to go and look at the stretch of river along Aynam Road. This time two years ago there were trees all the way along - the right hand side of this photo would have looked like the left. We always knew that some of the trees were under threat due to the flood management works but, up until a week or so ago, there had only been a bit of pruning. Now, however, there has been a swift and wholesale deforestation of the river bank. I don’t understand the theory as to why they had to go and - as you can see - the river is more in danger of drying up than flooding at the moment.
The only slight positive is that the trees further up the river have fences around them marked “Tree Root Preservation Area”
Which does beg the question, if the tree roots along that stretch of the river have to be preserved - because, presumably, they are a “good thing” - why did the trees on this stretch have to be cut down?