Bob La Trémouille reports:
1. Environmental destruction has started at Fresh Pond in Cambridge, MA and looks like it will get a lot worse.
2. The environment at Fresh Pond.
3. The area around the area under attack.
a. Water Works.
b. City Manager upzoning proposal.
(1) The shopping center between Danehy Park and Alewife Brook Parkway (not identified on the map);
(2) Another shopping area west of Alewife Brook Parkway and streets to its west; and
(3) A paved area currently used for parking north of the railroad tracks on the other side of the tracks from area (2).
c. Application, flood zone.
4. Area under attack and threatened.
5. Public presentation of the City of Cambridge, MA, March 9, 2006.
6. The damage progresses.
7. Destruction at Fresh Pond in context.
8. Major destruction in process at Fresh Pond.
1. Environmental destruction has started at Fresh Pond in Cambridge, MA and looks like it will get a lot worse.
It is very difficult for a person who loves our world to associate with the City of Cambridge. Just when you think they could not stoop any lower, they prove you wrong.
Massive environmental destruction has started and a lot worse appears imminent in yet another part of Cambridge, MA on the grounds of the Cambridge owned Fresh Pond reservation. 2000 to 3000 or more healthy trees could be destroyed along with key animal and bird habitat.
2. The environment at Fresh Pond.
Fresh Pond is located in the westernmost of Cambridge, essentially across the street from Belmont. It is about half a mile from the Charles River. Fresh Pond has for quite awhile been used as part of Cambridge’s water supply system along with several other reservoirs. The state system acts as a backup.
The grounds of Fresh Pond are a natural oasis among an increasingly dense part of the Cambridge/Belmont urban environment. The surrounding neighborhoods are non-dense by Cambridge standards, but by the standards of most of the Unites States, they are quite dense.
There is a lot of animal habitat and many heavily wooded areas.
A good map from Yahoo of Fresh Pond and its environs may be found at: http://maps.yahoo.com/maps_result?addr=300+Fresh+Pond+Pkwy&csz=Cambridge%2C+MA+02138&state=MA&uzip=02138&ds=n&name=&desc=&lat=42.384138&lon=-71.142145&mlt=42.384138&mln=-71.142145&zoomin=yes&BFKey=&mag=2&resize=l&trf=0&compass=w
3. The area around the area under attack.
a. Water Works.
On the eastern extremity of the Fresh Pond Reservation at the star on the Yahoo map is Cambridge’s recently rebuilt water works. The area north of the Water Works to Concord Avenue has been nicely revegetated in recent years.
b. City Manager upzoning proposal.
Directly north of Concord Avenue are shopping centers which the Cambridge City Manager has been attempting to upzone.
A zoning proposal he has submitted would allow development at a density 50% denser than Harvard Square or more. Hopefully that proposal has been defeated with at least a little help from me.
But the fight is not over. What upzoning will be proposed next is yet to be seen.
The area most endangered by the most recent upzoning proposal was the area west of Danehy Park. Prime targets are
(1) The shopping center between Danehy Park and Alewife Brook Parkway (not identified on the map);
(2) Another shopping area west of Alewife Brook Parkway and streets to its west; and
(3) A paved area currently used for parking north of the railroad tracks on the other side of the tracks from area (2).
This paved parking area is of major importance because this entire region is a sensitive flood zone.
That parking lot it should be used for badly needed flood storage with a storage tank constructed under it. The city manager wants to destroy the Alewife reservation instead. Alewife is a few hundred feet further north of the area show on the map (click north to see it).
c. Application, flood zone.
That portion of the Fresh Pond Reservation on the south side of Concord Avenue across from the core upzoning area is being attacked.
This entire area is a flood zone.
4. Area under attack and threatened.
A map showing the City of Cambridge’s public version of the proposal is at http://www.CambridgeMA.gov/CWD/northeastsector.frm. There is a good map there with greater detail on this development area. The non-wooded area shown in brown on the Yahoo map contains buildings which are part of the city’s Neville Manor elderly housing.
A distressing number of large trees west of Neville Manor were casually destroyed last Thursday and Friday.
There are a number of trees at the entrance to the Neville Manor complex with yellow ribbons on them.
5. Public presentation of the City of Cambridge, MA, March 9, 2006.
Unaware that destruction had started, last Thursday, March 9, I attended a meeting in the Water Works building at which the City of Cambridge, through its number two man, Mr. Rossi, was “briefing” the public on plans for the northeast sector, the area under attack.
The Cambridge link I have given you purports to describe the plans.
I got to the meeting at the very end. I asked Rossi about the yellow ribbons. He said they marked trees designated for pruning, not for destruction. Other people followed up with questions clearly demonstrating concern about possible (or existing) harm to trees by the City of Cambridge.
Rossi answered the specific questions with very narrowly worded responses.
Then he added quite significantly to the public announcement of plans. He started bragging about intending to plant 1000 trees. He and his assistants started knocking existing trees.
In response to a question, Rossi stated that he did not have to make any public announcement of pending tree destruction.
6. The damage progresses.
The next morning, I for the first time saw the incredible destruction of large trees on Concord Avenue. If they had failed to destroy all the “protected” trees, I cannot vouch for it. The amount of major, mature trees destroyed was outrageous.
Further examination of the northeast sector area shows construction barriers around what looks like almost all groups of trees in the area AND BEYOND.
Some, not many trees have the yellow ribbons which indicate do NOT destroy.
Further construction barriers have been added since then and further destruction of trees has been accomplished in the Fresh Pond Reservation in the construction area.
Clearly, this area cannot accept 1000 saplings without MAJOR destruction of existing healthy trees. Tree plantings in areas already planted indicate that the density of sapling planting would be quite a bit less than the existing tree density.
7. Destruction at Fresh Pond in context.
The Cambridge City Manager destroyed Vellucci Park at Inman Square a couple of years ago.
When he did it, he justified the destruction on grounds that the trees in Vellucci Parkwere “too thick.” Vellucci Park was planted in the early 80’s with trees that had become quite beautiful, with a thick canopy.
Those trees were destroyed to create a barren plaza with a fraction of the trees not destroyed. The trees in Vellucci Park were quite a bit less dense than the existing trees in this part of Fresh Pond.
8. Major destruction in process at Fresh Pond.
This proposal and ongoing effort could very possibly be a scorched earth development of almost all trees in the affected area. The City Manager is very clearly low enough to do it.
Destruction of animal habitat is quite certain. I have seen possums scurrying across Concord Avenue to get to their homes on Fresh Pond. Raccoons, squirrels, chipmunks, and rabbits are among many species highly likely in the area. Birds, of course, nest in the area.
And it is a flood zone.
But Cambridge has an environmentally destructive City Manager.
Fresh Pond and its animal and avian population, not to mention the trees are in deep trouble.
