Am I buggin’ you? I don’t mean to bug ya. Bono-Silver and Gold
I’ve been off on a tangent of late. A tangent that started when the City fathers and mothers of my fair town determined that it was necessary to cut down more than 50 trees on our Main Street. (There are pictures at the link.) The work commenced, with no public notice, on the day after Labor Day and was stopped at that night’s City Council meeting. By the time the first day of work ended there were 12 trees cut down, none of which were diseased or that had heaved the sidewalk more than 2 inches.
The majority of the trees cut were Honey Locusts and were more that 30 feet tall. (They have now been replaced with 10 foot tall, 4 inch caliper, Flowering Pears.)
The difference this has made to what was once an idyllic Main Street is significant. And that’s with only 12 trees gone. There are over 50 trees on the contract.
The contract, which was for nearly $400,000 dollars, was signed off on by a City Council that still holds to the absurd notion that no more than 4 trees were going to be cut down over the entire stretch on the street, which is over a mile in length.
$400k.
4 Trees.
I want that job.
The logic behind the tree cutting goes something like this…
- Some trees may be diseased and need to be cut.
- Others are heaving the sidewalk, and need to be cut.
- Some species may be incorrect for lining streets, and need to be cut.
How the City came up with count of 50+ trees remains unclear. But whats amazingly clear is that these Council Members really didn’t do their homework in any fashion or form. Especially when it cam to alternatives to cutting down the trees.
One option was Rubber Sidewalks, which use recycled materials to create a water-permeable walkway that allows the trees to get water without having to push the sidewalks up. These sidewalks are in use locally by municipalities that value what trees can do for the look and feel of a thoroughfare and could have been viewed, walked on, and evaluated with very little effort.
In short, with even a little legwork, the City could have resolved most of the tree issues without destroying a single healthy tree, or the look and feel of Main Street.
There has been considerable rancor about the issue. A community forum has had two weeks solid of back and forth on the trees, both pro and con, and a community effort to end the contract before more trees are taken down has begun on a blog called Beacon Trees. Unfortunately, it may be too late to save the other 39 trees as there are delay sanctions written into the contract that will cost the City about $8400 per day. Which, of course, is just one more example of the brilliance and business savvy of our City Council.