Seeking dialogue with school

To the Editor:

For the past two weeks during their spring break, the Riverdale Country School has employed the services of a surveyor and an arborist, Davey Tree, to study the condition of the trees on public property on the center divider of Fieldston Road from 253rd street south.

Their major attention was focused on the stretch of treed land between 252nd Street going south roughly 200 feet. They numbered and tagged every single tree of that city property.

When asked the purpose of this work, considering it wasn’t their property, the response was to identify and eliminate “dangerous” trees.

Was this done with New York City’s knowledge and permission? Is Riverdale Country School planning to cut the trees on this center divider without the input of its neighbors? 

To the homeowner neighbors of Riverdale Country School, the trees act as a screen for privacy and a buffer from the fine particulate matter in the exhaust from idling diesel buses and cars. This particulate matter is now recognized as the number one cause of cancer in our country. If some of these trees are weak and/or diseased, we would like to see them replaced with new healthy, native trees. Since this involves city property, we will work with the community and city officials in deciding the future of this area. Certainly removal of these long-neglected trees and replacing them with asphalt is not the answer.

We would like a dialogue with the Riverdale Country School to address this issue and others that would make for improved community relations and keep the “country” in Riverdale Country School.

We hope to resolve these issues to everyone’s satisfaction.

Joy Alessi