[Summit] Norway maples as "invasive" trees

[Jeffrey Cavanaugh]

I don't know if anyone has yet pointed out that this controversey made the
front page of the projo this weekend!

It would seem to me that the invasive nature of the trees is irrelevant.
They have been there for over 30 years and widely planted elsewhere so that
ship has sailed.  I think it comes down to preference and the relative value
of different courses of aciton.

First, I think, one needs to decide the value of those trees vs the value of
the fountain.  Keeping in mind there are lots of other significant trees in
the park.

Second, one needs to evaluate how much of a tradeoff there really is between
trees and fountain - it seems some of the trees being removed are due to
stylistic preferences and are not critical for the fountain restoration or
for protecting the pipes going forward.

Finally, something that has not been discussed much (I think), is the value
of the trees vs fountain in 5, 10 or 15 years?  I am concerned about the
reasons given in the Projo for the original shutting down of the fountain
which was expense of running it.  This is a classic pattern in RI public
works that something is built or lovingly restored and no money is set aside
ot maintain the thing.  What assurance do we have, assuming we are willing
to trade some trees for a fountain, that we will have a working fountain in
3 years, 8 years or 15 years?  I hate to be cynical, but I've seen this sort
of thing before and I have very high doubts that the fountain will still be
running in 10 years.  Very high doubts indeed.  Because if there's no
commitment to KEEPING the fountain running, we could probably have it broken
up and hauled away and some trees and grass planted in its place for  a lot
less than $180,000.  If this question has already been addressed, I
apologize, the volume of e-mail has been substantial and difficult to keep
up with even with laptop, desktop, home access, work access and iphone
access!




On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 9:27 AM, Coryndon Luxmoore <coryndon at luxmoore.com>wrote:

> There have been an number of comments and discussions in the ProJo comments
> and in the Parks presentation a few weeks back regarding the "invasive"
> nature of the Norway maples but little in the way of details about what that
> means.
>
> The US Forest service recommends that they should not be planted but I
> cannot find any recommendations about what to do with existing plants given
> that they were broadly used as city trees for many decades.
>
> I found few sites that discuss the tree and its impacts:
> - http://www.treecanada.ca/tree-killers/norway-maple.htm
> - http://www.invasive.org/species/subject.cfm?sub=3002 (Listed as a MA
> noxious weed)
>
> --C
>
>  --------------------------------------------
>
> Coryndon Luxmoore
>
> Interaction Designer
>
>
> coryndon (at) luxmoore (dot) com
>
> ---------------------------------------------
>
>
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