The sound of no hands clapping

In April 2011, despite protests,  a magnificent bur oak met its death in Champlain Park neighbourhood (on Northwestern Ave.) so that a developer and the City of Ottawa could stay out of court. The City’s legal team caved in to a developer’s threat that he would take legal action to challenge implementation of the Urban Tree Conservation By-law.

With a permit in hand, the developer cut the tree. He then sold the property, which has since been home to an empty house and a barren backyard, with no distinctive tree to shade the bungalow to the north.

Almost four years to the day after a distinctive bur oak was destroyed, the house on the same property was demolished (see photo above). A new sign tells what’s to come on the denuded lot.

It will be something like this half of a black box (see below), a building so large it is impossible to fit it into one picture without a panorama lens. Some of us have called Mayday! but who is listening to the sorry tale of monstrously large buildings edging out the mature, healthy trees of Kitchissippi Ward? 

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