I was standing at the wooden fence near where 240th St. slopes downhill towards Route 9 ... and an orange-colored Snohomish County Public Works truck rolled by ...
I decided to stick around and see what they were going to do - because with the County, you never know ...
I asked one of the vested guys, "What's up?"
He replied, "We're improving the road's sight-line."
So I stayed around and watched as they "improved" the sight-line for ... I dunno, maybe low flying aircraft, traveling ladder salesmen, stampeding giraffes, circus jugglers or stilt walkers.
I mean why else would they de-limb the trees 30+ feet up from the ground?
I asked if anyone in the crew was a trained arborist ... No, but a guy said he had some training in tree cutting.
Silly me, what was I thinking? ... A trained arborist? I mean, these guys had vests, hard hats, big trucks, a chainsaw and a chipper... isn't that enough?
And before you ask, the poled lines that parallel 240th St. are on the other side of the street and not close to the targeted trees.
Maybe whacking trees is like eating potato chips ... ya can't stop with one ...
Poor trees ... they've been standing there like forever, not harming a thing ...
and now they're just tall misshapen things.
And this was done by the County that wants to turn Wellington Hills Park into a REGIONAL SPORTS COMPLEX with giganto parking lots?
the "before" pic ... taken 10/10/13
ps:
And who were those two dudes who did a beeline for the woods with clipboards and a machete?
photos by Bill Stankus
October 22, 2013
2 comments:
One has to ask if this represents the kind of care and maintenance that we should expect from the Parks Department. I cannot think of one good reason to do this and know that reputable arborists would cringe at the sight.
Come to think of it, James Yap (manager of the Wellington Hills project) claims to be an arborist. His county bio also states that he joined SnoCo Parks in order "...to get back into historic preservation of parks/landscapes..."
So does this mean that Parks doesn't know what they're doing or just doesn't care?
Yesterday's free "trimming" made me think of the old movie western ... where a gang of nameless toughs (hired by a shady land developer) ride into a small town and proceed to intimidate the town folk.
In the movies, people don't trust the local sheriff or the city managers ... so they go and get an honest and equally tough Marshall.
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