Army Corps of Engineers Wants to Fell 100,000 Miles of Trees

[webmaster]

[url=https://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31191870/]News report that the Army Corps of Engineers wants to chop down all trees that border levees[/url] for fear of root damage, even though they admit that a tree has never been responsible for a levee breaking.

The Army Corps of Engineers is on a mission to chop down every tree in the country that grows within 15 feet of a levee — including oaks and sycamores in Louisiana, willows in Oklahoma and cottonwoods in California.

An Associated Press survey of levee projects nationwide shows that the agency wants to eliminate all trees along more than 100,000 miles of levees. But environmentalists and some civil engineers insist the trees pose little or no risk and actually help stabilize levee soil.

[applestar]

Isn't that the kind of overbearing, scientifically backwards government agency attitude that caused all the flooding and landslides in China?

I was yelling at the computer: "But... tree roots are what holds them together!!" even before I got to this part:

...and actually help stabilize levee soil.

[bonsaiboy]

Just think of it this way: when the levees colapse from unstable soil due to trees being cut down, who will be to blame? And what will that teach us and our government about their policies?

[rainbowgardener]

Oh man, oh jeez, oh wow.... that is incredibly terrible and stupid! Is there someone we can write to to protest this? Can we alert the Sierra Club, Environmental Defense Fund, Friends of Earth to to fight this? Do you know if anyone is already organizing against it?