And So It Has Come to This...

     One of this city's icons has been the banyan tree on Park covering several lots and providing photo opps to visitors and locals for generations. This four-story high gentle giant has been a soothing and graceful presence amidst the ever expanding incursion of population and development.

      But it seems, as with many things good and wondrous, even this grand lady is defenseless to the desires and wants of man. New Years Eve brought a paid crew of chain-sawed tree scalpers and arborists (one hopes that even they were crying just a little inside) who made quick work of much of the tree's healthy, vibrant and welcoming outstretched limbs and proud trunks. Witnesses described it as a "rape" but you decide:

     The neutering is not finished. Another lot apparently must be made suitable to buyers on the uncut side of the tree. The sickening sounds of chain-saws and stump grinders will continue.

     It is a shame in every conceivable sense of the word.

     Yeah, Happy New Year.

     -Bill Yanger