Lynwood Has Funds to Get to the Root of Its Tree Problem

When Estelle Moore and her husband, Virgil, moved to their Mallison Avenue home 24 years ago, the tree that abuts their front yard was as small and innocuous looking as a child.

Over the years, however, the tree has grown into a giant that has uprooted the sidewalk and driveway. And on occasion, unsuspecting children on their way to school have tripped and fallen over the pavement raised by the encroaching root system.

“That tree, some kind of elm, has been nothing but a headache. The roots have cracked and raised the sidewalk at least three inches,” said Estelle Moore.

The problem can be traced back about 30 years, when the city decided to beautify public rights-of-way with trees. City officials estimate that Lynwood now has more than 300 trees that are causing sidewalk and street damage.

Six Years of Complaints

Moore said she has spent the past six years complaining to the city with little result.

“They come out and draw lines around the tree. But nothing happens. They say they don’t have enough money,” said the 61-year-old homemaker.

Moore isn’t the only one in Lynwood complaining. The city receives an estimated 40 tree-related complaints a month, according to the Engineering Department.

Over the years, there has been some humor as well as a bit of mystery associated with the complaints.

Consider the man who always called in the evening to complain about his sidewalk buckling. In the morning, Engineering Department personnel would always find a flat sidewalk. The mystery was solved when it was discovered that the summer heat and the force of the tree roots caused the sidewalk to swell. The cool mornings allowed them to return to normal.

Exploding Sidewalk

Then there was the case of the exploding sidewalk. A man watering his lawn had his sidewalk crack and pop open under his feet. The city determined that the cold water, coupled with the summer heat and the root pressure, caused the concrete to buckle.

But now some relief is on the way for the Moores and other tree sufferers, Lynwood officials say. The city will use a $70,000 federal grant to remove troublesome trees, repair sidewalks, curbs and gutters and reconstruct streets cracked by tree roots, said Emilio Murga, associate city civil engineer.

It’s not enough to do the entire job, Murga said, but it is more than the city has ever spent on repairing damage wrought by spreading roots.

In previous years, the city was ineligible to receive money directly from the federal government because its population was less than 50,000, said Jennifer Jones, city housing and community development coordinator. Lynwood had to apply to Los Angeles County, which took at least 10% for administrative costs. Last year the city received a little more than $1 million for housing and community-development projects, she said.

Received Federal Funds

That changed when the city’s population topped 51,000 at the end of 1984, and Lynwood received more than $1.3 million in housing and community-development funds for 1985-86.

The funds will go toward various projects, including housing rehabilitation, economic development, public-service programs such as child abuse programs and public works projects that include tree removal and street repair, Jones said.

The City Council is expected to select a contractor for the job at its regular meeting Thursday. The work will probably start early next year and will take about 45 days to complete, Murga said.

He said it is the first year the city has had such a large chunk of money to do both tree removal and sidewalk repairs. Last year, the city used an estimated $8,000, which was all from general funds. No trees were moved.

“Basically, we were left with just patching a few sidewalks,” Murga said.

The city will concentrate on 65 locations that are considered some of the worst in the five-mile-square city, Murga said.

The project will include the removal of 24 trees--many of them more than 20 inches in diameter--repavement of 1,700 driveways and sidewalks in 7,100 places, the reconstruction of 1,100 feet of curbs and gutters and the installation of 10 curb ramps for the handicapped.

Before deciding on those locations, which include residential, commercial, school and shopping areas, the Engineering Department surveyed 90 miles of streets to determine the extent of the problem and set priorities. That survey found that the $70,000 worth of repairs is just a fraction of what is needed, Murga said. He said it would take an estimated $600,000 to repair all the damage found.

Joe Wang, city engineer and director of public works, said most of the damage comes from trees planted in the mid-1950s.

“The trees were planted to make the city beautiful, but no one realized they would cause so many problems,” Wang said.

The city, Wang said, does not plan to make the same mistake twice. He said the trees that are removed will be replaced with trees that will not grow so large that they cause damage.

There will be fewer ash trees, Siberian elms, liquidambars, and silver leaf maples, Wang said. They will be replaced with trees like flowering plums and carrot woods that won’t grow as big.