Today a spectacular elevated walkway has opened at Kew Gardens in London. This walkway is amazing, because it will take visitors eighteen meters high in the tree canopy for a birds eye view of Kew. The walkway it’s going to be the UK’s only walk-in sightseeing spot, expressing the rich world of the tree root biology.

The walkway is a 200m long string of twelve modular walkway trusses at eighteen meters high, connected by ten circular ‘node’ platforms that provide opportunities for contemplation and interpretation in the form of one meter long cast bronze plaques. A larger, classroom-sized platform at the mid-point of the walkway provides space for school groups of up to 35, and a bench to enable visitors to rest and enjoy longer views towards the Palm House. Access to the walkway is gained by a main stair tower after exiting the Rhizotron; the tower also incorporates a single stage hydraulic lift with a glazed panoramic lift car.

Once in the canopy of the fifty mature broad-leaved trees of the Capability Brown designed woodland area, tourists can view birds such as tawny owls, woodpeckers, kestrels and parakeets, as well as mosses and lichen, insects and bats at dusk. Tony Kirkham, head of RBG Kew’s arboretum and project manager for the Rhizotron and Xstrata Treetop Walkway project, says : “As a trained arborist I have had the privilege of being up in the tree canopy; experiencing trees at height and birds and other wildlife from a completely different perspective. It’s fantastic that we are able to give visitors the same experience and we hope it will make them realise that trees matter and we need to nurture them.”