Riverside Drive: Chopped

Photo: Red Car Property Neighbor, August 15, 2016.  Last week, a large crew clear cut all of the trees and brush on a number of vacant lots on Riverside Drive between Gilroy and Fletcher. This is well beyond brush clearance.  (Click on photos to enlarge.)

Photo: Red Car Property Neighbor, August 15, 2016.  A large crew worked quickly,   removing all evidence of all the protected native Black Walnuts as well as all the other trees on what appears to be 8 or 9 vacant lots.  Most of these lots are the same lots where the property owner cut down more than 15 protected native trees without permits in August 2014.  

We don't know if the property owner was fined for the 2014 tree removal.  These lots were a testament to the hardiness of California Black Walnuts, as many of the larger trees cut down in 2014 were growing back.

Photo: Red Car Property Neighbor, August 15, 2016.  According to CD13, the developer secured a permit from the City's Department of Urban Forestry to remove 1 protected native Black Walnut Tree.  Dozens of Black Walnuts were cut down last Monday.  In addition to the numerous protected native trees of all sizes, they also removed an unknown number of significant trees (with a trunk diameter of 8" or more).  Those trees don't count.

Photo: Red Car Property Neighbor, August 15, 2016.  We've said it before.  The City's Protected Native Tree Ordinance doesn't do what it purports to do - protect our native hillside habitat by protecting specific native trees.  Instead, it just gives developers a formula for cutting down our native trees, which are becoming more scarce every day.