[Summit] Norway maples as "invasive" trees

[Robert Mathiesen]

I suppose that the same neighborhood pressure that led the city to restore
the fountain could lead the city to maintain it and keep it flowing.  Why
not?  That's how things work in most communities.

Speaking just for myself, I spent my teen years living a few blocks between
two free-flowing city-maintained fountains (in another part of the country),
so I regard such fountains as one of the foremost amenities of city life.
To me, personally, it is worth the loss of a couple of dozen trees.  Your
"mileage" may vary, of course, and that's fine . . .  But there's no single
obviously best solution to this controversy.
- Show quoted text -


On Mon, Jun 28, 2010 at 10:02 AM, Jeffrey Cavanaugh <jeff at cavanaugh.org>wrote:

> 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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>
>
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