Dying Oaks

After gouging the soil underneath sensitive trees on Roosevelt Mall
and the track & field area, an illusion of smoothness now conceals the abuse caused by the 2009 Voodoo Music Experience.

Large dump trucks, a backhoe and a front-end loader were used to rub
sand in the wounds inflicted upon the soil and trees of City Park. In
doing so, however, the remedy becomes part of the problem for sand is
not a nutrient and heavy equipment only adds to compaction and damage.

It's like hiring a bricklayer to put makeup on your grandmother's badly battered
face. Instead of administering care via organic mulches to amend the soil and tools to
loosen and aerate the ground, heavy equipment contractors were hired.
It's one step short of paving, for using backhoes and small bulldozers
to spread the inorganic and inappropriate substance is second only to
laying hardscape.

Now, as the park is decorated with ornaments and lights, often strung
and hung inappropriately for the health of the trees, City Park will
once again glisten and glow for the holidays. But it's like putting a
Santa suit on a wheelchair-bound nursing home patient whose care
should be the subject of investigations.

City Park desperately needs a full time arborist with the authority to
stop abuse, to fine those who do not follow stringent rules that
protect the trees and to implement best practices for stewardship and
care.

As these photos reveal, the soil is still damaged. Compacted and
cracked dirt is embedded all the way up to the trunks of the trees in
the neutral ground of Roosevelt Mall. And, the deeply dug tracks of
heavy equipment reveal the lack of care and understanding of those in
charge.

New Orleans City Park is one of the most precious public spaces in the
world. It needs to be a leader in best practices. It is begging for
our care, love and help. We apparently still have a long way to go.

                     

Click here to download:

Voodoo_Music_Mess_Covering_Up_.zip (1624 KB)

It is a vision of New Orleans not seen since those painful days of
October 2005 when dead refrigerators and rubble were painfully piled
under the oaks that line the streets of our city. A time when the inner
sanctum of our neighborhoods and lives was muddied and crushed by the
failure of public systems.

The ongoing aftermath of last weekend's Voodoo Music Experience is the
morning-after vision of a callous, irresponsible and mismanaged event.
And as with other damage to City Park documented on this site for
months, should have and could have been dealt with during planning
stages, calling into question management at all levels of both Rehage
Entertainment and City Park.

As a promoter with experience in Central Park in NYC and the National
Mall in Washington, Rehage knows better. Were these horrible pictures
depicting the aftermath of a music event in either of those respected
and venerable public spaces, it would be national news and the
promoters and subcontractors would be paying a very heavy price in
both dollars and reputation.

But, it's just City Park, where damage begins on paper, during the
planning stages, on the desks of well-paid and overworked public
servants we taxpayers entrust with the stewardship of this
irreplaceable and and vital landscape. And that fact raises many
troubling questions about leadership, responsibilty and consequences.

It remains to be seen whether there will be any answers....or
atonement, if such a concept is even possible.

                                                                                                                                                               

Click here to download:

Voodoo_Music_Mess_Rehage_Rains.zip (12441 KB)

Day 2 of my observations of the setup of this year's Voodoo Music
Experience produced what I expected, more unsupervised subcontractors
damaging the soil and trees.

There are some good examples, though, as the major production
companies used proper methods to reduce the impact of trucks and heavy
equipment for large stage setup. Those pictures are here to contrast
with what the beer vendor, electrical crews, sponsors and others are
doing.

Again, trucks and heavy equipment are tearing up the ground in the
vital root zones and in wide swaths of the park. And the trencher was
used in the neutral ground of Roosevelt Mall, causing damage to roots.

With rain expected again before the fest starts, major efforts need to
get underway ASAP to reduce damage, not only from the setup, but for
the event itself.

I post these pictures not to disparage the event or producers, but to
encourage them to step it up and protect our precious heritage.

I truly hope this is the most successful event ever. But I also don't
want it to be the most damaging ever. I'll be visiting again today to
see how things are going.

                       

Click here to download:

Voodoo_Music_Mess_Day_2_Subcon.zip (1550 KB)

Despite the best intentions of the production company staging this
week's Voodoo Music Experience, subcontractors, vendors, artists and
others working to stage the mega-event are already doing damage to
City Park. As these pictures show, failures abound. In too many
instances, trucks and heavy equipment are not properly insulating
their wheels via plywood boards and other basic techniques to reduce
impact. Heavy vehicles and equipment are driving and parking under the
trees. And worst of all, a trencher was used without proper
supervision and severed roots as it was run from the main stage to
Roosevelt Mall.

Though City Park has asked state arborist Tom Campbell to assist (free
of charge, another issue in itself), Tom can't be everywhere at once.
He is a talented and conscientious arborist; but, he is terribly
frustrated and alone in his efforts to prevent damage. As these photos
illustrate, damage is ocurring.

With the rains last night and more forecast, the coming days are only
going to produce more ugly images and damage.

The bottom line is that City Park needs to beef up its horticultural
staff by hiring--and paying a decent wage to--a qualified arborist. I
recommend that the Louisiana Urban Forestry Council be utilized as the
review committee and that this action become a high priority. I'll be
writing a letter to the City Park Improvement Association this week to
put this suggestion into the hands of the park's management. In the
meantime, the lack of resources, of strong rules and enforcement, and
of people will ensure that this year's Voodoo fest will likely be the
most damaging ever; if, in fact, it hasn't already achieved that
dubious distinction.

Three days away from the start and all the good intentions in the
world cannot excuse what's already happening.

                       

Click here to download:

Voodoo_Music_Fest_Already_Dama.zip (1389 KB)

Landscape architects Cashio Cochran went concrete crazy with the Great
Lawn project in City Park. And as Cashio noted in the Times-Picayune,
he feels that sometimes you just have to take "risks" with design.
Well, I have to disagree.

You don't take risks with New Orleans' legacy. You don't take risks
with the ancient live oaks of City Park. You don't take risks with the
gifts of Creation that serve to nurture your soul and connect you to
your spirituality.

But evidently Cashio measures risk differently when it means leaving
his concrete, brick and steel mark on the works of Nature. There is a
word for this kind of risk taking: hubris.

I'll be posting in greater detail about this on my main blog,
http://nolamotion.com

Thanks for visiting. Please do your part to take care of our world or
it's going quit taking care of us.

                   

Click here to download:

Going_Concrete_Crazy_in_City_P.zip (1491 KB)

I really like the people behind the rebuilding of the Lafitte
Projects. They're nice. They said the new development will have many
green and innovative features. But evidently everything must fit in
nice square spaces and these trees are just not part of their vision
for what the neighborhood should be.
 
As with other developments in Post-K New Orleans, I'm sure there were
many discussions about how to do this for the good of everyone. And
the fact that lots of trees are going to be planted in the new design
will be touted. But this rationalization seems to me to be like
driving a bus with all your college seniors off the cliff and then
saying it's ok because of strong kindergarten enrollment. I guess the
great-grandchildren of the residents will one day appreciate it.
 
30+ mature trees cut. 7 trees, many of which are badly damaged and
thin, were retained.
 
I feel so betrayed right now.
 
Here's what they say it's going to look like:
http://www.providencecommunityhousing.org/Designs.html

Here's what it looks like on September 16, 2009.

                                   

Click here to download:

Killing_the_Green_with_Green_B.zip (2003 KB)

I've been watching Jesuit High School in New Orleans abuse live oaks
for more than a decade. They installed concrete to make more parking,
killing trees on Carrollton. They installed concrete on Banks St,
damaging the trees on that beautiful street. And now they've done
extensive work on what little green space they have on Carrollton
where the landscaper installed a deep bed of sand followed by turf
grass.

 Landscapers such as this company are sadly out of touch. Turf grass
and live oaks do not get along. There is a chemical warfare at the
root level between these plants and it damages the oaks.

 Now, after choking the trees with concrete, disturbing their root
systems with extensive digging and the use of heavy equipment, the
coup de grace ( or is that coup de grass) in now in place. The oaks on
Carrollton will now start to look more like the oaks on Banks which
are slowly dying as evidenced by these pictures.

 As an educational institution and a Catholic one as well, this
"progress" gets an "F" and a suggestion that someone go to confession
and repent.

                 

Click here to download:

Jesuit_High_Still_Doesnt_Under.zip (1247 KB)

If there was any doubt that the Great Lawn project is going to
negatively impact the iconic and beautiful mature live oak across from
the Peristyle, I hope these pictures provide proof. Easily two-thirds
of the canopy of this formerly undisturbed tree have now been dug up,
framed and filled with concrete. Not one but two deeply dug twelve by
twelve foot squares are for some kind of major fixtures that box-in
the tree. Those squares each have one foot deep trenched footings. The
sidewalk has been expanded into some kind of huge pad covering
thousands of square feet and extending under the canopy within a few
feet of the base of the tree.

 This development is characteristic of the style of the design firm the
park has used for many years. They claim to be following guidelines
for construction under trees but I saw no evidence of careful
construction. Also, the fact is THERE SHOULD BE NO DEVELOPMENT UNDER
MATURE TREES.

 These trees don't need concrete "enhancements" and we don't need to
have more impermeable surfaces, either in the park or anywhere else if
we want to maintain the integrity and height of the ground in this
sinking city.

                       

Click here to download:

Concrete_Marches_On_in_City_Pa.zip (1588 KB)

So many questions come to mind while witnessing the "rebuilding" of
the St Bernard Housing Project into the new Columbia Parc. Besides the
sloppy site management and obvious stormwater violations all over the
place, the damage to the live oaks and the crammed and apparently
denser arrangement than the original projects, the big question is why
we would expect the Bayou District Foundation to do a good job in City
Park when they obviously don't care about the ecology of the St Bernard Projects/Columbia
Parc site?
 
The trees in these pictures have been crushed, banged, chopped and
used as a place to shade, lay and lean building materials and heavy equipment. Really sad.

Note that the last pic is not from this construction site, it's of heavy equipment parked under trees by the contractor doing the I-10/Causeway project. They had a temporary building and many other trucks, bulldozers and other heavy equipment under those trees. This is an ongoing issue with contractors that I will cover in a future post.

The sign says Laugh, Cry, Shout and that's what I'm doing via this site.
Is anybody paying attention?

                                                 

Click here to download:

Columbia_Parc_and_the_Bayou_Di.zip (3194 KB)

The reconstruction of the golf course at Pontchartrain Park (founded
1952) is underway. Construction is proceeding with the live oaks
cordoned off for protection. Though metal fences are recommended
because the orange plastic ones often are knocked down by any number
of things from wind to heavy equipment, it's encouraging to see so
many trees fenced. Not sure why the cypresses get no love, though. But
I'm crossing my fingers that this one goes well.

                     

Click here to download:

Reason_for_Optimism_Pontchartr.zip (1426 KB)