We take no pleasure in the distress of others but the moaning coming up from the Bloor St West shopping area is a bit ironic. It appears the City has been busy chopping down trees. Not all the way down mind you. Just about half way down. That way the ugly stump if left there looking like a dead man walking. If any of this sounds familiar it will be because South Bayview was the site of a similar pointless slaughter of trees back in 2008. Many, but not all, the maples on the east side were lopped off half way and left to rot. They were there for the better part of two years before the elegantly named Urban Forestry Branch came along to rip them out of the planters prior to sidewalk work. New trees were planted the same day and in a few months they were uprooted for the sidewalk work. A sidewalk tree if just a sidewalk tree but you would have to say this episode was more than careless. Two years. There is a lesson here about how merchants money might be spent. The Bloor Business Improvement Association spends (and is assessed) millions each year to make itself beautiful. Among all the costly flowers and artistic planters it gets tree stumps. Those who think a BIA is the way to make Bayview beautiful may wish to ponder whether they would be further ahead just to buy some planters and hire a gardener for pennies compared to what the City will cost. And the trees? Just hope for the best. That’s what they do down on Bloor Street.
