The city replaceth what the utility taketh away; Tampa, FL

Seminole Heights gets more trees:
Four 'little gem' magnolias are taking root on the front lawns of homes on East Fern Street in Seminole Heights. Over on Miami Avenue, more than 10 magnolias, red maples and winged elms are the newest landscape eye-candy.
The greenery, within the city's right of way, is from a free city-sponsored tree planting program promoted in the neighborhood with a little help from the nonprofit Old Seminole Heights Preservation Consortium.
'It's a nice partnership,' said Peter Spanos, the consortium's tree committee chairman.
Spanos said he hand-delivered about 100 letters asking residents if they wanted trees. About 20 people responded. An email elicited even more tree requests.
In the next weeks more than 80 homes will receive about 100 trees.

In September many residents were horrified as swaths of tree canopy were cut away by contractors with Tampa Electric Co. TECO officials said it was a public safety issue to get tree branches away from overhead power lines.

Guest columnist says Knoxville Utilities Board needs reasonable tree-trimming policies; Knoxville, TN

Guest column: KUB needs reasonable tree-trimming policies » Knoxville News Sentinel:
For the past four years, Knoxvillians have become increasingly concerned about the Knoxville Utilities Board's tree cutting policies.
Recent public discussion has renewed the debate as to what can be done to force KUB to adopt a reasonable policy that will stop excessive tree cutting and unnecessary removal of thousands of trees and other vegetation per week, destruction of private property, reduction of property values, and permanent disfiguring of Knoxville's most beautiful trees.
KUB Board Chair J. Thomas Jones, in a guest column in the Jan. 10, News Sentinel, asked, 'Should KUB trim trees away from electric lines?' He then proceeded to repeat KUB's latest rationale for its current policies.
He asked the wrong question and ignores many issues while defending KUB's position and its spending of at least $6 million per year.

‘Ugly’ trees have locals hacked off at utility pruning; Frenchs Forest, Australia

‘Ugly’ trees have locals hacked off - Local News - News Cumberland Courier:
TREES lining Kens Rd in Frenchs Forest have been cut back so severely by Energy Australia that they resemble telegraph poles, local residents say.
On Thursday contractors for the energy company hacked at trees up and down Kens Rd and surrounding streets to clear branches from the powerlines.
“They have made them look like telegraph poles,” resident Peter Tweedie said. “They’ve lopped off all the branches so they might as well have cut them down and planted new trees.”
Mr Tweedie said the work had left the street with ugly skeletons of trees.
“You would have to see it to believe it,” he said. “It is pretty unsightly and looks as though it was not done properly.”
A spokesman for Energy Australia said the work was carried out to prevent power outages caused by tree branches coming into contact with overhead power lines.

ARRA-Duke Energy project trades stately oaks for crepe myrtles under neighborhood power lines; Raleigh-Durham, NC

Bull City Rising: Duke/Gregson street tree canopy replacement starts before New Years Day:
The cherished oaks that line urban Durham's streets give near-downtown neighborhoods much of their character. But their time has been widely recognized to be coming to an end, as the trees reach the end of their natural lifespan.
And, of course, today's oaks run smack into the little problem of Duke Energy power lines, which weren't so much a concern when the trees were first planted during the Great Depression era as a WPA project.
It's fitting, then, that the economic stimulus effort of the Great Recession would come along to help replace some of these trees. (Goodness knows it's better than the trees being left to their current wacky-cutback state.)

Toronto Hydro transforms battle between power lines and trees, looks to solutions that protect both; Toronto, Canada

Protecting a city's greenery, one branch at a time:
Trees earn their keep in the urban landscape.
'Trees can help us enjoy our urban life so much more,' says Janet McKay, executive director, Local Enhancement and Appreciation of Forests (LEAF).
Beyond their natural beauty, urban trees improve the quality of urban life in countless ways. Their leaves produce oxygen while removing carbon dioxide from the air, with an average tree cleaning up four to five kilograms of pollution in a year. They help prevent soil erosion and are natural habitats for birds, insects and other urban wildlife.
Trees provide privacy, add to a home's value and can lower home heating and cooling costs by up to 10%. Not surprisingly, the City of Toronto has set the goal of increasing the city's tree canopy to 30% coverage in 2020 from 18% in 2006. And Toronto Hydro Corp. is committed to helping.
'We do a yearly Earth Day tree-planting event with Toronto Hydro,' Ms. McKay says. 'More than 100 Toronto Hydro employees come out and we plant several hundred trees and shrubs. They're just amazing and are so willing and keen to help out.'
Among its other tree initiatives, the corporation, which was LEAF's first corporate sponsor 11 years ago, has planted 10,000 native trees across Toronto in partnership with the Ontario Forestry Association.
But for all their benefits, when the wind blows and the storms pound, trees can cause havoc, with fallen branches crashing into cars, homes - or worse, people. And they can bring down a power line in a flash, turning it into a live hazard on the ground, leaving homes and businesses without power.
Because of this, overhead power lines and trees have historically been at odds. In recent years, however, Toronto Hydro has been transforming these odds into opportunities for greater efficiency, public safety and healthier urban trees.

Toronto Hydro upgrades distribution lines to tree cable as part of carbon neutral strategy, reducing tree-wire conflicts; Toronto, Canada

Protecting A City's Greenery:
This transformation began in 2007, when Toronto Hydro Corp. officially embarked on a sustainability program that included becoming carbon neutral, says Blair Peberdy, the corporation's vice-president, marketing, communications and public affairs.
That year, Toronto Hydro established its carbon footprint was 156,800 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalents and set out to identify ways to reduce it.
'Part of this [footprint] is due to line losses -- the energy that is lost between the generating stations across Ontario and the transmission lines that feed into Toronto,' Mr. Peberdy says. 'The line loss in Toronto Hydro worked out to about 3% of all the power that we buy from the grid.'
That loss was due partly to trees, so Toronto Hydro has been upgrading its distribution system as well as installing what is known as 'tree cable,' which has a thick plastic coating to protect the conductor from accidental tree contact.

Lowcountry residents allege trees needlessly "butchered, decapitated and chainsawed" by utility; James Island, SC

Lowcountry residents upset by city snipping tree canopy The Herald - Rock Hill, SC:
Utility workers say arborists helped with health plan
By Brian Hicks - The (Charleston) Post and Courier JAMES ISLAND -- James Island residents say the trees along Harbor View Road look like extras in a slasher film — they've been butchered, decapitated and chainsawed.
And they blame SCE&G for the slaughter.
Along the road, trees have been cut back at least 10 feet from power lines.
In some cases, oaks, crepe myrtles and even pecan trees have been cut into a less-than-appealing “Y” shape, as if they are perpetually dancing to the Village People.
Some people say it is downright ugly, others fear it's going to kill the trees.
“It's horrendous, and I believe there is a more conservative way to do it,” said Margaret Fabri, a local attorney. “They have ruined the canopy of these trees.”
Contractors for SCE&G have been on the island in recent weeks as part of the utility's routine trimming to keep the power lines clear.

Neighborhood Watch: Fenty Intervenes in Palisades Tree Massacre; Washington, D.C.

Neighborhood Watch: Fenty Intervenes in Palisades Tree Massacre - City Desk - Washington City Paper:
The Issue: As summer began giving way to fall, idyllic life in the Palisades was shattered by a dose of cold, cruel reality from D.C. electricity provider Pepco. To improve electrical reliability, Pepco wanted to cut down about 400 trees in the neighborhood as well as (gasp!) 16 others along a few blocks of MacArthur Boulevard.

Overhead wires and beautiful streets can coexist...?; Washington, DC

Overhead wires and beautiful streets can coexist - Greater Greater Washington:
Some streetcar opponents and some streetcar supporters are arguing against overhead wires, saying that they're ugly or that they're incompatible with lush tree canopies. Ralph Garboushian sent along some more pictures of overhead wires from around the world.

Washington, DC’s Palisades Citizens Association takes on Pepco with Mayor Fenty; Washington, DC

Washington, DC’s Palisades Citizens Association takes on Pepco with Mayor Fenty:
Last night, the Palisades Citizens Association (PCA) held a community meeting and voiced their long-standing concerns in front of Mayor Adrian Fenty and Ward 3 Councilmember Mary Cheh about their battles with Pepco to preserve the Palisades neighborhood tree canopies.
The Palisades is situated towards the northern edge of Georgetown, adjacent to the Potomac River in the upper Northwest quadrant. It is a quiet area that has managed to resist “urbanized” advances to maintain its “small town” feel; as well as remain a neighborhood with one of the highest concentrations of green spaces and foliage in the city – to include legacy trees several decades old. Earlier this year, Pepco had launched the “Palisades Enhanced Reliability Project” to improve electrical reliability performance in the area. Unfortunately, this project involves removing trees and/or trimming them down heavily into a “Y” shape, which not only damages the tree but the overall aesthetics of the landscape as well.

Pinecrest leaders push FPL for answers on why undergrounding not feasible-impacts to tree canopy cited; Pinecrest, FL

Pinecrest leaders push FPL for answers - Pinecrest / Bays - MiamiHerald.com
The mayor and village leaders want answers from Florida Power & Light regarding its planned power lines along U.S. 1.
BY TANIA VALDEMORO
tvaldemoro@MiamiHerald.com
Pinecrest leaders fired off a letter to state environmental regulators seeking more information on how a high voltage power line project would affect their village.
Florida Power & Light has proposed installing overhead 230-kV transmission lines connecting its nuclear power plants at Turkey Point to a substation in downtown Miami starting in 2012. Part of the proposed path of the lines would be in Pinecrest along U.S. 1.
Last week, Village attorney Cynthia Everett and Mayor Cindy Lerner sent a letter to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection calling the utility application "incomplete."

Bowie UTC is 46% - study used to pursue utility for costs of ecosystem service lost to vegetation management for reliability; Bowie, MD

Tree canopy gets green thumbs up
City planning additional plantings, may offer residents vouchers
by Rachael DeNale | Staff Writer

A recent study has found the City of Bowie has better tree coverage than officials had estimated.
In the meantime, the city has begun a forest management plan to help make the tree canopy even larger.
Roughly 46 percent of the land in the City of Bowie is covered by urban tree canopy, according to a report completed in May by the University of Vermont and commissioned by the Maryland Department of Natural Resources in conjunction with the City of Bowie.
The study, done in 2008, was carried out by the Spatial Analysis Laboratory of the University of Vermont's Rubenstein School of the Environment and Natural Resources in consultation with the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Forest Service Northern Research Station.
BGE utility clearing work, which is ongoing in Bowie and will remove about 15,000 trees to improve the city's electrical reliability, is expected to reduce the canopy by about 1 percent. The removal is concentrated in residential areas, where the canopy will be reduced by 20 percent. The study was completed before the work began.

Homeowner sees more than red after utility tree-trimming; Shreveport, LA

Homeowner sees more than red after tree-trimming | shreveporttimes.com | The Times
Gary Jaynes' backyard is an oasis. Shade-loving plants stand watch as chickadees, cardinals, the occasional woodpecker and others nibble on birdseed left on the Shreveporter's South Highlands driveway.
Until recently, a live oak gracefully spread its branches over the entire yard, providing protection for plants and respite for wildlife. The tree also offered Jaynes a shady spot to watch nature at work and afforded him the privacy he craves.
'The trees to me are what makes this whole area,' Jaynes said. 'They give it its whole character.'
But since tree crews working for Southwest Electric Power Co. chopped some 15 feet of the tree's branches away from nearby power lines, Jaynes not only has a view of his plants wilting in the sunlight that now floods the backyard but also of unsightly equipment once obscured by the tree's branches.

Modest wind after long rain equals widespread tree failure; Burlington, VT

Wind knocks out power around state | burlingtonfreepress.com | The Burlington Free Press
By Matt Ryan, Free Press staff • May 31, 2009
Strong winds felled trees across Vermont Sunday afternoon, leaving thousands of people without electricity.
As of 7:30 p.m., a few hours after the winds had subsided, Green Mountain Power reported having 5,500 customers without power. The utility called in all its line crews, spokesman Robert Dostis said, adding it was too early to say when power would be restored.
The areas in and around Montpelier and Vergennes were the hardest hit, Dostis said. He reported parts of the utility’s service area experienced winds blowing at about 40mph.
Bill Kahn of Ridge Street in Montpelier said a large tree fell in his yard.
“It’s pretty amazing. It’s this huge tree, it must be 200 years old taking up my whole lawn,” Kahn said.

Utility arborists and commercial arborist at odds as to how to prune town's old trees; Summerville, GA

Old Trees in Summerville Need Special Care—Not Whack Job | WJBF:

It’s one of the most beautiful sections of Augusta, and Summerville residents want to keep it that way. Neighbors are worried about the old trees that are part of the Hill’s charm. WJBF News Channel 6’s Paige Tucker reports.
By Paige Tucker
WJBF News Channel 6 Weekend Anchor/Reporter
Published: May 20, 2009
Augusta, GA—A massive tree that just fell in Summerville is a personal loss to many who count the area’s trees as one of the neighbors. Part of Summerville’s charm is the tree-lined streets that provide curb appeal and a canopy of shade.
A certified arborist, Roy Simkins takes interest in the preservation of the trees and offense to the way they’re often treated. “There’s a right way and a wrong way to prune a tree. That’s one of the reasons you need an arborist. It’s easy to buy a chainsaw and send a guy up a tree to cut a limb, but it’s something else to know the proper way to do it,“ says Simkins.
A lot of that pruning is done by Asplundh, a sub-contractor of Georgia Power hired to keep its power lines clear. “It occurred to me some years ago that Asplundh loves to cut the max because the more they cut the faster the tree will resprout and the more work they have. It’s sort of a make-work business,“ Simkons says.

Miami landscape architect assails utility's "tree assassins" and their pruning methods; Miami, FL; 5/2/09

fpl's Tree Assassins: It's All About Profits Biscayne Times - Miami,FL,USA
The notion that any public utility has the inherent right to visually pollute our communities with unbridled overhead power lines, ugly concrete or tar-stained wood poles, and disastrous pruning techniques are anathema to sound residential planning and the highest standards of community design.
And the idea that the pruning of trees by FPL’s “tree assassins” is “now an accepted practice” could not be further from the truth. Such action may be accepted by FPL, by Asplundh Tree Company (the “pruners”), and by the uninformed, but it is highly unlikely that even the most novice gardener would support the argument that FPL cares about trees, or about how they are pruned.

Old silver maples + power lines = removal, but city is replanting at more than twice the rate of removal; Medford, OR; 4/23/09

Time to Leave Mail Tribune - Medford,OR,USA
City arborist Bill Harrington said the silver maples should never have been planted on the west side of the street, where the power line runs, because they are genetically inclined to grow to 80 feet. Instead, they have fought for space with power lines over the years and never attained their normal height and fullness.
"We're talking about silver maples that have been pruned excessively over the years by the power company," he said.
When the trees beneath the power lines are removed, Harrington said the city plans to replace them with flowering plums, which don't bear fruit and won't grow tall enough to interfere with the power lines.