Bike path won't mean loss of many large trees

The actual loss of large native trees amounts to about 67 trees. Selectively cutting these is not the same as clear cutting square miles of ancient coast redwoods or Tsongass temperate rain forest.

I've been seeing a lot of ardent objections to cutting 803 trees along the rail corridor to make room for the Segment 10 and 11 bike and pedestrian path.

To find out how many large native trees were actually slated to be cut down under the Ultimate plan, I looked at the Environmental Impact Report.

Of the 1,883 trees in the arborist's table, more than a thousand are invasives, such as eucalyptus and acacia. But of the native trees slated to be cut, only about 67 are even moderately substantial trees, 20 or more inches in diameter.

That's right. Only about 67 big native trees. The big natives include 47 live oaks, five redwoods, four big leaf maples, plus a handful of willows, elderberries, and toyon.

Many other natives are just a few inches in diameter. And even trees listed as over 20 inches often turned out to be bunches of small saplings or suckers.

Of course, we can quibble about which groupings count as “significant trees.”

Go through the table yourself, but I bet you won't come up with many more big natives even if you allow for all groups of 4-inch-to-10-inch trees.

The bottom line is this. On the one hand, we have a narrow strip of land with a hodgepodge of shrubs, saplings, and mature trees.

On the other hand, we have existing and valuable human infrastructure — the rail corridor — that we are now putting back into use as a bike and walking path (and eventually light rail).

All trees have value — for wildlife, for our enjoyment, and for carbon storage.

But the edge of the rail corridor is not a flourishing native forest ecosystem. And the actual loss of large native trees amounts to about 67 trees. Selectively cutting these is not the same as clear cutting square miles of ancient coast redwoods or Tsongass temperate rain forest.

Those who ride the parklike path or the train will surely enjoy the thousand-plus trees that remain under the Ultimate plan, including many large oaks, redwoods, and eucalyptus trees.

Please urge your supervisor to approve the Ultimate trail plan for Segments 10 and 11 on April 23. Only then can county staff enter into an agreement with the California Department of Transportation to receive the county's already allocated $68 million grant, awarded in 2022.

Jennie Dusheck is a biologist with a BA from UC Berkeley and an MA from UC Davis, in ecology and evolutionary biology. She is author of three editions of a college biology textbook and a contributor to many other academic books.

She is a Firewise community leader and a member of the The Climate Alliance, of Santa Cruz.