Plans for a redesign of Linear Park in North Cambridge are based partly on faulty information that risks destroying tree canopy, city councillors said Monday in passing a policy order for the path’s restoration.
The order asks the city manager and Department of Public Works to consider reusing the existing design for the 30-year-old walk-run-ride path from Alewife Station to the Somerville line, keeping natural materials by not paving them over, implementing a climate resilience maintenance plan and even using existing “elegant” lamps and lampposts to avoid generating waste and adding to the project’s carbon footprint.
A plan to restore Linear Park has been in the works for nearly two years with a redesign that would widen the paved path and added seating, play areas and lighting. The widening of the path in an official estimate would cause six trees to be removed – “yet others who have studied this, who have expertise in the area,” city councillor Patty Nolan said, “have found that in considering any trees that could be damaged by widening the path, dozens more trees could be compromised.”
The number of possible compromised trees is unknown due to incorrect measurements of trees taken when the plan was developed – a fact acknowledged at a Committee on Public Planting meeting Oct. 11.
Every place staff checked a surveyor’s work, they were measuring a tree’s distance from the side farthest from the path, “so on paper it made it look like the trees were further away from path than they really were,” said Kevin Beuttell, the city’s supervising landscape architect. “We did field measurements to correct those, so those trees are now shown closer.”
Maggie Booz, a resident and member of the Committee on Public Planting, said during public comment Monday that at least 70 trees are within 3 feet of the existing pathway’s edge in Linear Park.
“A widening path risks their lives,” said Booz, who was also previously on the city’s Tree Task Force.
Linear Park, Nolan emphasized, does need restoration to improve the environment and for an expected influx of parkgoers after a large development opens in the area. But any plan for the park should make trees a priority as “essential infrastructure.”
“The Committee on Public Planting was also able to point out additional concerns about the irrigation plan and the maintenance strategy, things that were not included in the original plan,” Nolan said.
The resilience plan according to the order would restore the irrigation system, improve soils along the path and protect the trees’ “critical root zone.”
The point is to make sure city staff “is aware of and focusing on the essential tree canopy piece of Linear Park, which is some of the most consistent green space in all of North Cambridge,” Nolan said, and to take into account the word of experts on advisory committees – a potential guard against errors in planning.
The concerns of advisory groups must be taken into account, councillor Paul Toner agreed.
“I think we need to do a better job of communicating with them,” Toner said. “This is something that we need to take a close look at, and I think we can come up with a great solution for everybody.”
The council voted to refer the issue to the Neighborhood & Long Term Planning, Public Facilities, Arts & Celebration Committee, where staff could respond more directly about the number of trees that could be affected and other aspects of the plan.
“When you add the fact that we have 50 percent of the national average of open space, that leads me to believe we’ve got to do everything we can to get this right,” councillor Dennis Carlone said.
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2 years of planning and the experts don’t know how many trees will be cut down. Oh ok.
Should put the quick build team on it – prolly use the plastic pylons but at least it will get done.
If the way Councilor Nolan described the policy order (as an effort to ensure the park redesign team is taking tree concerns seriously) actually matched its content, I would also completely support it. The problem is that instead, the PO uncritically repeats many of the incorrect talking points being spread by those opposing the park redesign.
The text of the PO includes “double the paved area,” “already AASHTO compliant,” “will lead to additional heat island effect impacts,” and “width that matches the Somerville and Belmont paths” — all misleading claims found almost verbatim in FOLP/Friends of the Linear Path’s campaign materials.
Nolan also said during the meeting that “this is not meant to say there would be no changes or not even no widening,” but the original order itself quite clearly states otherwise:
“ORDERED: That the City Manager be and hereby is requested to work with DPW to restore Linear Park by re-using the existing award-winning design, including retaining the existing pavement footprint, or consider making the entire path non-pavement”
It was only when someone else noted this contradiction that the language was amended/softened to say “to consider” reusing the existing design before passing.
I hope the Committee on Public Planting’s comments about irrigation and maintenance are taken into account, to make sure the existing trees as well as the 100+ new trees that will be planted as part of the redesign will thrive. And while I am also glad the survey errors were caught and expect the city’s team to adjust the design plans if necessary, measuring from the trunk edge rather than the center would have affected recorded tree locations by a couple inches at most (unless there’s a giant sequoia in the park that I’ve missed). It is unlikely this would drastically change the number of tree removals.
@prc, the city has been quite clear with each design iteration how many trees are expected to be cut down (5-6 in the latest plans). It is the folks against the redesign who have been wildly inconsistent and hyperbolic with their numbers, going from “mature tree damage/loss of 80+” in the original FOLP petition to “100+ killed/removed/maimed” as per FOLP president Charles Teague’s recent op-ed/the current FOLP webpage.
The “2 years of planning” is what makes it extra frustrating that a small but vocal group is trying to render meaningless all the public engagement that’s gone into the park redesign to date.
picoplaff Yes it’s incredible 2years in and geez whose on first.
It’s one bike / walking path that will hopefully be great. It’s funny when I am scolded “the experts are in change.”
Anyways hopefully the public can assist the experts so they can get it done in 3 or 4 years.
I don’t understand why they put all of that nonsense into the bill. I went to the meetings, maybe the councilors didn’t, but I did. The city is not even touching the trees for the path, they are cutting a dead tree down and redoing the whole park and fixing it up. Why do people have to go bonkers over stuff like this. The city is fixing the park, making it more useable, and adding a lot of trees. We don’t have to fight about every change in the world.
Cathie Zusy wrote to the council saying how fixing the path is going to make it become a bicycle express way, I don’t know what planet these people are on, it’s a path, get off it. Some people go fast, some people go slow, that’s why you make it wider, it’s not complicated. She said the park won 4 awards and shouldn’t be changed from the award winning design. Give me a break, using that logic, Magazine Beach should still be where we store weapons for the war because it is historic.
Cities and public parks can get better without a nimby meltdown every single time, with hysteria and lies about 100 trees being cut down. I am really upset that Patty Nolan put this in and lied about it, and Paul Toner and Quinton Zondevan lied too in the meeting about how it was just to have another meeting about it. That is not true and people should be aware of it and pay attention
Perhaps we can convince the Neighborhood & Long Term Planning, Public Facilities, Arts & Celebration Committee to consider adding an entrance to the Linear Path on the southern side. Westley Ave has a perfect location for a gate that would better connect all those living in North Cambridge below Harvey to the path.
Does anyone know if the re design for Linear path is still happening or did this get paused with everything else?