A Graphic Illustration...

Last week I created a cardboard construction with the idea of going to the Putnam Trail and holding it up in various locations to show the extent of foliage/tree removal on Putnam Trail, should Parks plan go through.  It measures exactly fifteen feet wide, with ten feet painted black (representing asphalt), three feet on one side of the proposed paved area and two feet on the other.  These measurements correspond to the width of the plan proposed by Parks.  On May 31, five of us met at the trail and carried out the project.

It became very clear to us how healthy the trail was, alive with mature trees, many of which were native, and the sounds of birds.  We even saw a nesting Baltimore Oriole in one of the trees which would in all likelihood come down.  There are also plenty of plants, wildflowers and smaller trees, which, judging from the number of mature trees, will become mature if allowed to grow as nature intends.  Far from the picture painted by its detractors of a degraded trail that couldn't even be seriously called a nature trail, it showed us very clearly how beautifully nature has recovered in just thirty years from the days when the railroad had last been used.  It made us all feel rather sad, as it revealed the true face of the planned destruction as something tangible, and the awareness of what would be lost all the more something that would be forever lamented.