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Chapter 10 | Public Trees: The Plan for Park Trees
Public Trees:
The Plan for Park Trees
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WHY PARK TREES MATTER P. 83 | THE PARK TREE RULES P. 84 | INVASIVE SPECIES CONTROL P. 91 PARK PLANTING PRIORITY P. 93 | THE PARK TREES PLAN P. 95 | 38 PLANS FOR 97 PROPERTIES P. 96
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park without trees is just a field. Some parks include fields—as they should for active recreation and large gatherings—but the beauty and utility of many of Cedar Rapids’ parks comes from their trees. To visit these places now can be heartbreaking; the ragged tops of those trees that survived only remind us of the many that were lost. This memory of former glory spurs us to replant them as quickly and robustly as possible. But this replanting is also an opportunity to make these parks better. Best practices in park forestry have advanced since Cedar Rapids’ parks were originally designed. Applying these practices—as embodied in the eight ReLeaf Rules—to the city’s parks results in plans that move beyond the simple replacement of lost trees.
