July is an awfully cruel month to remove shade trees in Tucson, and Bourn Partners got an earful about it when they felled about 50 eucalyptus trees on the edges of a Northeast Side parking lot last week.
The trees, taken from a commercial center on East Tanque Verde Road that includes a city library and sheriff's substation, will be replaced with native palo verde, said Suzanne Startt, property manager for Bourn Properties, but not before the parking lot is repaved in August.
"I completely understand how people feel," said Startt, who has had to explain her company's decision to the complaining public. "I just don't want to wait for someone to get hurt," she said.
Some of the trees had grown too tall, she said. Trunks were leaning and limbs were splitting.
In May, said Startt, lightning hit one tree and "threw a 50-foot branch about 100 feet."
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In the long run, the switch to palo verdes could be a good thing, said Irene Ogata, the city of Tucson's urban landscape manager. Ogata worries, though, about the shade that will be lost in the meantime.
She said the city backed down on removing eucalyptus from the street in front of the Tucson Convention Center after local groups lobbied against their destruction.
Ogata, whose job is to look at strategies to increase the number of shade trees in Tucson, said it is difficult to create a "succession plan" that allows big non-native trees to be replaced with smaller native ones without losing shade in the meantime.
"It's a shame they couldn't have incorporated those trees in their design," said Doug Koppinger, coordinator of Trees for Tucson. "There is the argument that eucalyptus drop things, but it's a shame to cut out big trees in parking lots, especially when it's 110 degrees out here."
Koppinger said the eucalyptus were not heritage trees. "There wasn't anything particularly big or old. I know the area because I go to the (Bear Canyon branch) library a lot. I always park in their shade."
Startt said Bourn Partners purchased the 71,292-square-foot center three years ago, knowing it needed updating.
"We decided this was the time for refurbishment, and phase one begins with the parking lot," she said. Bourn will space the new palo verdes throughout the lot, to provide shade and to comply with the city's parking lot ordinance, Startt said.
Tina Lee, aide to Tucson Councilwoman Carol West, who represents the area, said residents are generally supportive of what Bourn is doing. The shopping center had been in decline, with cracked pavement and vacant stores, Lee said. West, who was out of the country Monday, met previously with the developer and the neighborhood association about the project, Lee said.
"The new plan is good. It was just a shock to see the trees go," Lee said.
Startt said the parking lot will be planted with "Desert Museum palo verde because it doesn't drop as much debris, grows pretty quickly and has better shading."
Koppinger said a palo verde doesn't have a lot of leaf mass to cast shade. Mesquite would be better, but it drops a lot of debris, he said.
"There is no perfect tree."
"It's a shame to cut out big trees in parking lots, especially when it's 110 degrees."
Doug Koppinger
Trees for Tucson
