This story is told by Tad Sooter in the Review. I recall investigating the fate of those trees a few years ago when the development file was first presented, at least 4 years ago as I addressed the issue the Friends of the Trees blog I had created at the time. I then spoke with the architect who told me it was the public works department that had wanted the trees cut down because they did not want the sidewalk to curve. I don't recall there was a that time any mention of parking along the street and I am sure the architect had planned to keep all the willow trees by having the sidewalk go around them. Years later we are now presented with a very different lay out that cares more for parking spots than for trees. It will be up to us -as a community- to defend those trees as they surely cannot defend themselves.
Here is what i had written on this development 4 years ago: plus ça change...
About the public works department and the trees.
The public works department should be asked to provide a tally of the significant trees they cut down.
We have been shocked by the way the department was considering cutting
down the Willow tree on the Hoskinson House plot just because it was on
the way of the sidewalk!
The Willow tree has been saved because of the architect but there was
no one to prevent the public works department to cut down a beautiful
Madrona tree that was in the way of the sidewalk being built on
Ericksen.
Despite
the promises made to Olaf Ribeiro that this Madrona would be protected.
This type of behavior makes us extremely suspicious of the way the
public works department considers trees: maybe the only good trees are
cut down trees?
Promoting sidewalks should not mean cutting down significant trees.