To the casual observer, the 700 block of Elm Street in Albany may look a little bare these days. A couple of good-size elm trees are no longer there.
The day before Thanksgiving, a couple of signs caught my eye. They were attached to two trees in the 500 block of Washington Street.
A year and a half ago, the City of Albany took out nine trees on Second Avenue behind the Oregon Department of Human Services building, just east of Lyon Street, and planned to replace them.
A reader asked me Sunday if the trees on Queen Avenue marked with green ribbons were to be cut down. I told her I would check on Monday. And the answer is yes, the city intends to have those trees felled.
So why, the Question Man wanted to know, did they leave chest-high stumps when a crew felled roughly 20 street trees on Albany’s Ninth Avenue in April? Why not saw the trunks off near the ground?
Before they rebuilt 10 blocks of Hill Street in South Albany this summer, all the street trees were cut down. Now the trees are about to be replaced.
City: Cutting trees to save the sidewalks
The Albany neighborhood between Periwinkle Elementary School and Waverly Drive is about to lose its mature street trees. At least one homeowner wishes the city would leave the trees be.
Tags: 22nd Avenue S.E., 22nd Place S.E., Albany streets, Periwinkle Elementary, redbuds, street trees, sycamores, tree felling, trees