Mitigation funds inadquate to address decline in street tree population; Weston, MA; 4/23/09

Plans take root for replanting tree canopy Weston Town Crier - Framingham,MA,USA
Members of Weston’s Tree Advisory Group, affectionately known as "TAG," have been spending some time lately puzzling out what’s happening to the town’s tree canopy. A combination of factors – like proliferating utility wires, widening sidewalks, disease and road salt – causes the death of about 90 street trees per year.
With the approval of the Board of Selectmen, the committee has been visiting nurseries and tagging 10 new trees to fill in gaps where some of those mature trees have died.
The job of replacing significant tree loss can seem overwhelming when one considers the fact that many of Weston’s old timers were 75-foot hardwoods like red oak, sugar maple or white ash. Their girths are often more than 2 feet across. The small fund left to us by the MWRA, in acknowledgement of the 25 acres of forest they removed, can pay for very few young trees – 7 feet tall and 2 inches in diameter.