The charity behind the scheme says the Central Scotland Forest is taking the form and significance envisaged.

Already 5,500 hectares of woodland has been created, 190 miles of road corridors improved, 250 miles of paths, cycleways and bridleways created and 30 miles of hedgerows restored.

The vision is to transform the 160,000-hectare region bounded by Edinburgh, Glasgow, Falkirk and Lanark by planting trees and improving landscapes.

The Central Scotland Forest will not be a traditional forest, but a mosaic of woodland. The intention is to cover an area the size of Greater Glasgow – 34,000 hectares – with trees by 2015.

Historically, much of the area's landscape was derelict and degraded, and this worsened as the region's heavy industry and mining all but ceased to exist.

"For a long time it has just been a part that people pass through as quickly as they can," said Simon Rennie, chief executive of the Central Scotland Forest Trust.

He wants the tree-planting to benefit the 750,000 people who live and work in the region.

Mr Rennie said the aim was social as well as environmental, to improve access to healthy activities and the community for people living nearby.

"What's it doing for people's lives? That's the key. Our view is that we shouldn't be doing anything that has an environmental outcome but not a social outcome."

He thinks trees and forests should be planted not just in areas far away from where people live, which could be "in Africa for all their accessibility" but also in urban areas.

This means that, as well as planting large areas of new woodland, stretches such as hedgerows, roadsides, school playing fields and community areas are the focus of the trust's attention.

The trust believes woodland can have a positive effect on physical and mental health and can address issues such as anti-social behaviour.

A pilot project is being carried out to improve the biodiversity of school grounds, and wildlife gardens are being created in social housing areas.

Mr Rennie said the idea of planting trees is not always popular, especially in areas of degradation, where the natural environment can be the last issue on people's minds, and where woods can actually be seen as ominous.

"People like areas of open grass. Woods are places where historically people did bad things – where people hid and jumped out."

But he said the key is making the projects relevant to those communities, by making sure they benefit the lives of residents.

"We have to make the link between what we are doing on people's doorsteps and short-term immediate benefits, such as schools using it as a resource, putting it into the health agenda so people can take walks, and providing employment."

Instead of always creating large areas of forest, strips of trees are often planted, to change the appearance of the landscape.

And often the focus is not trees at all, but sprucing up areas to improve them for people living nearby, or visiting.

One such scheme is the Helix project to create an "eco-park" in Falkirk, which has attracted £25 million in lottery funding.

Work will start this year and, in partnership with Falkirk Council and British Waterways, the Central Scotland Forest Trust will aim to transform more than 300 hectares of unused land by planting 750,000 trees and putting in 20 miles of paths and cycle tracks, as well as a new section of canal linking the Forth and Clyde Canal into the Forth Estuary.

Centre stage will be two giant horse sculptures. The 100ft-high equine structures on the banks of the canal will function as a boat lift.

"When these things are up, they will be on the back of £10 notes in a few years time," predicted Mr Rennie, who was awarded an MBE for his services to the environment earlier this year.

As well as improving the environment for people, it is also hoped the Central Scotland Forest will help species that rely on woodlands, including the British bluebell, black grouse and pipistrelle bats.

The British bluebell is under threat from the Spanish variant, but the trust has set a target of mapping all bluebell woods by 2009, planting British bluebell bulbs in appropriate areas.

Bat boxes are put in place for pipistrelle bats and a survey into black grouse in the woodlands will be carried out by next year.

Mr Rennie thinks forests could also be used to help heat the country, with waste wood being used to power biomass boilers for heating for schools and businesses.

"It's never going to heat the nation because there isn't enough wood and there isn't the supply chain to do that, but what it could do is create a strong contribution if we created a stable market," he said.