Oak grove slumber party/vigil Tuesday night, Berkeley

You should mention who the four organizations suing are. The biggest one is the Panoramic Hills Association, a bunch of millionaire NIMBY misanthropes who absolutely abhor the idea of 6 football games being held in the stadium. They have blocked the number of concerts at the greek Theater and the volume at which bands can play. They want to shut down Cal football and don't really care about the trees. Another organization is a few people from Tightwad Hill who want to continue watching games for free.

The seismic argument is disingenuous. The site just west of the stadium is not *directly* on the fault and is on a geologically sound foundation. Distance from the faultine is not as relevant in terms of seismic resistance as the type of soil a building sits on. That site is far, far safer seismically than anything in western Emeryville for example (landfills, would liquify and swallow buildings!) The facilities are intended to replace the facilities in the bowels of seismically unstable Memorial Stadium, potentially saving dozens of human lives.

The other sites are a bad idea because they aren't close to the stadium, where the football practices are held. As well, those buildings will be replaced with other buildings for the university. If you put the gym there, new buildings on campus could end up being located where there are trees, like the new Asian Studies center which unfortunately is built where beautiful redwood groves once stood.

The tree cutters aren't "uninformed", it is the protestors who are uninformed... There are no "unique dependencies" in the narrow strip of oaks between the stadium and the road. In fact, this grove DID NOT EVEN EXIST before the stadium. It was planted there along with the stadium. It is a relatively recent MANMADE environment! Old pictures of the site from the 1920s PROVE THIS FACT.

You also are totally misinformed about this being "the last oak grove in the Berkeley lowlands". There are several bigger oak groves with older trees in Berkeley.

Another fact that is not mentioned is that the project will turn the parking lot north of the stadium into a green area and move the parking spots underground. MORE GREEN AREAS, and MORE TREES AROUND THE STADIUM!!! How can you be against this?!?

I think the intention behind many of the protestors is noble, but misguided. May I suggest working with the university for the benefit of the THOUSANDS of other trees on campus? You can force the university to financially support the UC Berkeley Tree Fund, which is SCANDALOUSLY UNDERFUNDED by UC ($1,000 per year!!!) Hundreds of great trees are not being properly cared for on campus. I would like to see the university put at least half a million dollars into the care of the thousands of trees on campus. It would also be great if many of you treesitters could volunteer your efforts to care for the trees (planting saplings to replace dead trees, pruning trees, etc...)

http://landscape.ced.berkeley.edu/~treefund/index.html

Just a few examples:
"You should mention who the four organizations suing are. The biggest one is the Panoramic Hills Association." You certainly don't mention who they are. I consider the City of Berkeley the "biggest."

"saving dozens of human lives" yes in two years the university would move people out. If their real concern was saving people's lives they wouldn't have built the stadium on a fault line.

"The other sites are a bad idea because they aren't close to the stadium" by golly it would be terrible if footbal players had to walk a bit before getting exercise!!!


We would love to see your photos from the 1920s. Please stop by the grove any time, 24 hours a day to continue these discussions.

Trystan, you suggest that folks who want to protect Berkeley's trees should work with the university to expand trees in other places, and you mention the UC Tree fund.

Do you really think that by negotiating with the university the people can "force" the university to do anything? If the UC signed an agreement to fund more trees on campus in exchange for an end to the tree-sitting, what makes you think the UC would live up to its end of the bargain?

The UC is run by one of the most unaccountable and corrupt bodies in the state: the UC Regents. They run the university like a for profit corporation and have repeatedly broken agreements made with many entities, including the state legislature. How do you suggest we force the university to invest in more trees? The state of California can't seem to force the UC to pay its janitors more, even when state funds have been explicitly designated for that purpose. You might also want to ask CUE members what happened to the $2.5 billion that was approved in 2002 by the state to give them a raise. If the UC got more state funding funds for trees, they sure wouldn't spend those funds on trees.

In this instance, the only people who are in any position to force the university to do anything are the brave folks sitting in the trees, who have thusfar forced the university to not cut them down.

That comment was directed at Berkleyean, not Tristan.

You're right about Berkeley being the biggest party here, but it is in it because of the lobbying from the Panoramic Hills Association, rich homeowners who hate the University and its activites, from football to concerts at the Greek to Southside student life. The City of Berkeley is also the biggest hypocryte, they have cut hundreds of trees in the recent past just to save money on their upkeep and maintenance. No treesiters then, because there weren't powerful local organizations like the PH behind it... How about the new building, on Oxford and Allston, part of which will be built over a grove of mature trees? You might want to ask Shirley Dean what she thinks about it next time she climbs on a tree...

trystan said: "If their real concern was saving people's lives they wouldn't have built the stadium on a fault line."

The stadium was built in 1923!!!! Why do you keep abstaining from using common sense in your arguments?


The location issue is both practical, logistically and environmentally sound. There is a severe shortage of space on campus, future building will threaten to take place over valuable green space inside of campus, which IMHO is more important than the oak grove in question because that grove is adjacent to a whole lot of green space in the Canyon and the Hills, whereas the campus proper is surrounded by urban areas on all three sides. That is why the location of the new facilities is very sound from the perspective of someone who wants to preserve the green areas within campus. Let the university build classrooms and labs in your alternative suggested areas (things that they are going to build in the next few years) instead of taking out more green areas in the campus proper, like they did for the Asian Studies libraries!

The current project only has an adverse environmental impact in the SHORT TERM. Half of the current grove will be preserved, and a new green pedestrian plaza will be created where the parking lot now stands northeast of the stadium. 20 years from now, the area will look just as green as it is now, and it will be a more attractive environment for students and visitors. There is another, even larger parking lot across the street just south of the business school which will ALSO be turned into a green pedestrian plaza. All in all, the area will be much more pedestrian friendly and will have more trees ten years from now. That is one of the most frustrating thing about this whole affair from my perspective...

There are just so many misconceptions here, like the fact that the grove is NOT NATIVE, it was an artificial landscaping that was put up as part of the stadium. This is clearly visible in the detailed aerial photo from 1928 linked below, five years after the oak grove has been planted as landscaping for the stadium. You can see that most of the half dozen oak trees that predate the stadium lie near the roadside and were planted as landscaping earlier when Gayley road was built, they line the road. Most of those trees are not going to be cut, only those that are close to the stadium's edge will be cut. And only TWO healthy oak trees which predate the stadium will be cut!!!

http://sunsite.berkeley.edu:8085/AerialPhotos/airphotoucb28/ucb-28-4.jpg

"Do you really think that by negotiating with the university the people can "force" the university to do anything? If the UC signed an agreement to fund more trees on campus in exchange for an end to the tree-sitting, what makes you think the UC would live up to its end of the bargain?"

All that would take is to fund the UC Berkeley Tree Fund! If they can only direct 0.5% of the private funds they are raising for the new facility to be allocated to the UC Tree Fund, HUNDREDS of trees on campus will be saved, restored and properly taken care of in the next decade or two. You guys forget that alumni LOVE their campus and a huge part of the beauty of the Berkeley campus lies in its flora. Don't underestimate the environmental snesibilities of Cal Alumni, even the Cal Alumni who support the football program. In fact, a lot of the opposition from us alumni is because we don't think the environmantal impact of the new facilities is really bad in the long term. This grove did not exist before the stadium, and the area west and north of the stadium will have more trees in the long run, while on the plus side student-athletes and staff will be able to work without having their lives threatened by the next big earthquake.

You need to work on a win-win solution to ACTUALLY effect a positive outcome on the flora of campus and use this opportunity to boost the UC Berkeley Tree Fund (which I have supported in the past.)