By Ed Jones
The Median Tree Replacement Project has run into objections from the Oregon Department of Transportation. ODOT permission is needed to do the work on the highway and ODOT no longer favors trees in medians and has concerns about maintenance and safety. They would prefer to remove the trees and replace them with low growing, native drought resistant shrubs with some ground cover in between. This is a bold project, since many of the trees would not be removable without heavy equipment and the “bricks” that separate the cutouts are not real bricks, they are merely patterns on concrete.
The challenge, with both old and new trees, is the maintenance work needed to keep them healthy. Traffic on Highway 30 has become a dangerous place for pedestrians and any work in the medians requires flaggers, signs, and cones to keep the workers safe. Those services are expensive, costing more than $1,000 a day.
The trees came to Linnton as part of a program to calm traffic and restore a sense of neighborhood after the death of Ryan Calvert in 2001. The trees do slow traffic, and they remind people that Linnton is a community and not just another wide spot on the road to Astoria. Our focus should be on additional efforts to slow traffic and not the removal of the trees we have.
We are negotiating with ODOT about the future of the medians. We want to save our trees, improve our medians, and make our neighborhood safer. We will see what agreements can be reached with ODOT.
Questions or need info? Contact Ed Jones at chair@linntonna.org.