By Philip Sean Curran, Staff Writer
Seven diseased oak trees on Nassau Street are due to be cut down in the coming weeks in a move that local officials say will transform the look of Princeton’s main thoroughfare.
The state Department of Transportation, having responsibility for Nassau because it is a state road, marked the trees with orange X’s. Crews plan to remove one tree per week.
Municipal arborist Lorraine Konopka said Tuesday that the trees are infected with bacterial leaf scorch, an insect-transmitted disease that impairs water transmission from the roots of a tree to the branches and leaves. She said the disease is affecting oaks throughout town.
Trees planted downtown have a harder go of it since they have limited room to grow their roots and are located in a hotter area, where the heat from the street and pollution from motor vehicles produce a “heat island effect.”
The oaks help give Nassau its distinctive look, one that will change once the seven trees come down. The alley method of planting the same species of trees in columns provides an artistic effect, but it proves difficult when trees get diseased.
She said that when one oak gets sick, there is a ripple effect since the insect or insects carrying the disease go from tree to tree — the equivalent of an outbreak of a contagious disease among people.
“We just have to accept that the trees are going to go. I’m in mourning already,” Councilwoman Jenny Crumiller said Tuesday.
Ms. Crumiller said that when trees have been cut down in the past, people in the community get upset. “Trees take a long time to grow, and it’s sad when you lose a large tree,” she said. “I’m definitely a tree-hugger.”
It is not clear if the state plans to replant the trees once crews are done cutting down the diseased ones. If not, the town “likely” would do so, Ms. Crumiller said.
“We want to keep our downtown as shaded as possible,” Ms. Konopka said.
Ms. Knopoka said the municipal shade tree commission is due to discuss the issue at its meeting later today. One option is to plant different tree species to prevent another disease from infecting all of them at once.
There has been a gradual loss of trees on Nassau. Ms. Konopka said she counted eight tree pits, places where a tree used to stand but was taken down. She said she did not know why those other trees had to be removed.
