voice of bainbridge

The city could/should regulate the presence of trees in parking lots via a green ordinance for urban sustainability

Thinking about what happened to the trees at the ferry terminal parking I wondered about existing city regulations elsewhere. Just google parking lots and trees: here comes the regulation adopted by the city of Sacramento. It is about shading trees but it makes perfect sense to require the presence/planting/maintenance of trees on parking lots. Looks like the city is going to hire a consultant...and as usual such regulations already exist.

Who is responsible for the disastrous "pruning" of the trees in the parking at the ferry terminal?

Reading the February 20 issue of the Bainbridge Review we don't learn what firm was responsible for this job. A manager for Diamond Parking does not provide any specific information nor apologize for anything wrong. The City acquiesces by saying nothing inherently wrong (illegal) was done and we get the usual argument about private property. Diamond Parking is a big corporation, they claim to be the biggest private parking company in the world (and I bet they are). It is not clear that they were in charge of this "pruning" as they could only be in charge of operating the parking while the property is owned by somebody else. This somebody else could be an entity called Winslow Marine LLC but the property tax map does not provide any clue about who they are, but for the address of an accounting firm in Bellevue. I think the people deemed "responsible" should publicly say so and offer a compensation to our community or explain to us why all is well. What type of compensation? They could plant more/new trees in this parking lot and/or provide money for trees to be planted. They should come up with internal guidelines to avoid such bad practices in the future.

Loving old trees (The opposite of Winslow)

A picture by Sempé

Were there no lots for sale for parks in Winslow?

An editorial in the Review would like us to believe there were never lots in Winslow available for sale for parks and that's why the land use commission has not bought any. I beg to differ with this "presentation" as one of the first (if not the first) lot the Open Space Commission considered was a lot close to cohousing that would have been a perfect pocket park at a cheap price. The commission (only people living outside of Winslow?) declined to buy...

God Can Make a Tree, but Olaf Ribeiro can save its life

It is on the cover of today's Wall Stree Journal, an article by Susan Warren. Congratulations Olaf :) All the friends of the trees applaud.

How many trees in Winslow? How many new parks?

With a growing population but without -yet- any new downtown park (contrary to the forgotten although minimalist comprehensive plan) the future of the quality of life in Winslow is grim: there seems to be much more concern about parking spaces for cars than for trees that make life enjoyable in a city. For a good presentation of the many arguments in favor of trees within a city, read this month article about Paris in the National Geographic.

The community forestry commission wants to hear from you

The Community Forestry Commission (pdf) is holding an open house session on Tuesday September 12 from 7 to 9 PM. I am not sure there is much to gain but if a few good people wish to attend. Maybe you can also email your suggestions? So many of our previous suggestions have been totally ignored it's hard to persist but what else is there to do? All my best wishes to the people who want to attend. If someone wants to take a digital mp3 recorder contact me and I'll lend you one.

Developer vs Trees: A Call for Help

My name is Dan Hagen. Joyce Hansen and I own a piece of waterfront property Next to
Driftwood cove and beneath Southworth Landing communities, about 2 miles sound on
the beach from the Southworth Ferry.

A developer is suing us to try and enforce a very poorly written "view addendum". 
At issue is the view that his housing development had in 2001. 

Olaf Ribeiro emails the Council Members about tree cutting on the island

Dear Council members,
I wish to record my great disappointment at the tree cutting rampage that has occurred in the past couple of weeks on the island. Without a tree ordinance and lack of enforcement, tree cutting companies have discovered that they have free reign to take down magnificent healthy trees with no consideration for the subsequent cost to the environment.