Keeping things in perspective
concerning the "new two-way southern access road from the WVU
Coliseum parking lot", below is an article that Jonathan Weems,
Arboretum Specialist, wrote in the Core Arboretum Email News:
High Stakes at the Arboretum
Maintaining the integrity of urban green space is a challenge. As
expansion and improvements tax the capacity of developed spaces,
there is a temptation to nibble away at green space. Persons who
use and value green space sometimes find stakes that suggest
planned development. They become alarmed. They ask questions.
That happened last week at the Core Arboretum. Visitors since
Presidents’ Day have found several stakes in the highest corner of
the Arboretum, near the Coliseum parking lot and Monongahela
Boulevard. In response to a number of inquiries, this email news
item is an attempt to explain what I can about those stakes and
what they mean.
The stakes, labeled “toe,” appear to indicate the bottom of an
embankment for a new roadway that will sweep in a broad arc from
the southeastern end of the Coliseum parking lot, through the top
corner of the Arboretum, to a relocated and redesigned
intersection at the bottom of Evansdale Drive. The planned
relocation of this intersection, moving it roughly 280 feet closer
to the Patteson Drive intersection, is an adjustment (from an
earlier roadway proposal) that will spare the Arboretum parking
lot. This 24-space lot will continue to be available to Arboretum
visitors.
The roadway proposal, part of the Evansdale Master Plan, may sound
familiar. There were several public hearings about the Master Plan
two years ago. There was an article in the Dominion-Post about the
proposed roadway affecting the Arboretum. An email news item dated
1/18/12 addressed it.
Goals of the new roadway include improved safety for pedestrians
crossing Monongahela Boulevard, and improved vehicular access into
and egress from the Coliseum parking lot. All WVU personnel
involved in this matter are working sincerely for the betterment
of the University. Differences of opinion, when they occur,
concern the planning process and the effects of the proposed
roadway on the Arboretum.
Efforts to have input into roadway planning have been frustrating.
Like Arboretum visitors, I simply found the stakes last week. I
alerted the Arboretum’s management committee and my superiors in
the chain of command. We have since been shown engineered drawings
of the proposed roadway that are not to be shared with the public
until the project goes out to bid, perhaps in March. A brief WVU
Enews item today (2/24/14) indicated the WVU Board of Governors
approved the new roadway proposal at its meeting of Friday,
February 21.
The area involved is very small. You can look at the stakes and
see for yourself. Please do not remove stakes! Soon to be lost are
dozens of exotic trees and shrubs planted from the 1950s through
the 2000s. Some represent common species, but others are
relatively rare. In addition to their intrinsic value for teaching
and enjoyment, the trees provide a visual and sound barrier
between the most visited part of the Arboretum on one side and a
power line tower and area of high vehicular traffic on the other.
In addition to causing the removal of these trees and shrubs,
construction will force the relocation of heavily used sections of
one trail and the top of the Service Road. These relocations will
necessitate the removal of more trees, some planted by humans and
some by Mother Nature. The new roadway will introduce more noise
into the Arboretum.
On the plus side, planners and engineers believe the roadway will
meet the goals of improving pedestrian safety and vehicular
traffic flow. These are important and worthwhile goals. I only
wish they could be achieved with less impact on the Arboretum.
The WVU administration, which has been steadfast in its successful
defense against a right of way claim that could have led to the
construction of a very different roadway in another part of the
Arboretum, has an opportunity to further demonstrate its goodwill
by working out a conservation easement that would protect the
Arboretum against having more bits nibbled off in the future. Such
an easement has been suggested. The reception this suggestion may
find within parts of the WVU administration is unknown as of this
writing.
Without a conservation easement, it is all too easy to imagine,
years or decades into the future, instances when more stakes
appear, indicating more construction projects that will nibble
away more little bits of the Arboretum, again and again, until the
day the Arboretum ceases to be the teaching and service entity we
have known.
With a conservation easement, WVU could enhance its goodwill by
ensuring the preservation of a low-cost facility much used by WVU
classes for a century (though only acquired by WVU in 1948), a
facility beloved by generations of students, alumni, and
townspeople, a green space with significant natural assets that
are most unusual to find on a University campus.
At the Core Arboretum, the stakes are high.
On 02/24/2014 10:00 AM, Morgantown Pedestrian Safety Board wrote:
Of note: http://shar.es/FjkyH.
New Evansdale Drive/Mon Blvd signalized intersection being
created in the hopes of alleviating the CAC/Coliseum
jaywalking issue - a high priority location in our Plan with
high potential for fatality - though we rated the
feasibility low because of the expense.
Christiaan
Walk more, safely
Morgantown Pedestrian Safety Board
Christiaan Abildso, Chair
Bill Reger-Nash, Vice Chair