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# Residents Blast City Council Plan to Remove Downtown Ficus Trees
- URL: https://www.smdp.com/101307-story/
- Published: 2007-10-13T15:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-24T17:49:48.000Z
- Author: Guest Author
- Tags: Environment, Santa Monica Airport, #archive-import

“NO, I DON’T THINK THE CITY COUNCIL is going to keep from cutting the ficus trees down. City Council seems to take their own counsel and not that of those who elected them. I think it’s a great travesty because those trees help add to the small town-ness of the city. I’m very bereaved at the whole situation.”

“HAVING LEARNED THE TREES WILL BE transplanted close to the airport, where the trees do not do well because of the pollution caused by the planes... as a Treesaver, I believe we should do whatever it takes to save these trees from murder.”

“IT ONLY MAKES SENSE TO SAVE THE trees that are already there and healthy. Mature trees filter out more pollution and have a bigger impact on the environment than saplings. It doesn’t make any sense to replace trees that have been there for years with something that will have a negative environmental effect. I still can’t believe the City Council still wants to do this. It just doesn’t make any sense.”

“YOU KNOW WHAT? THEY OUGHT TO find a happy medium. Take the diseased trees out, leave the other ones standing, destroy the diseased trees and fix the sidewalks.”

“NOT ‘ENOUGH WITH THE TREES ALREADY.’ The trees need to be saved. It’s the most sensible thing to do, all the way around — for beauty, for air quality, for practicality, for financial reasons. The trees need to be saved and not enough has been said until they are.”

“THE TREESAVERS HAVE TO WIN THIS fight, because if they don’t, it only proves that someone at City hall is getting their palms greased. To go against the will of the people — so many citizens adamantly opposed — makes one wonder what is going on.”

“SOME OF THE PEOPLE LIVING IN SANTA Monica have marbles for brains, and sometimes they take them out and play with them. If they spent as much energy looking for senior housing as they have on these ficus trees, maybe Santa Monica would be a lot better off. Sure, the trees give shade. They also ruin the sidewalks and plumbing, people fall on them, the city is sued. They need to lay this ficus mess to rest and get on bigger issues than trees.”

“I DON’T KNOW WHAT THE OUTCOME will be, but this should be a wake-up call against routinely reelecting the same lifers on the City Council... and perhaps even, someday, an accountable mayor, and the judgment of a forester who planted along Pico (Boulevard) those sad, dying London Plane trees — so inappropriate for this climate, can hardly be trusted.”

“I AM THRILLED THAT THE TREE activists have gotten them to postpone taking down these trees without more investigation. I hope it’s not just a temporary victory. I hope we’re going to show this City Council and city planners that the city has some say in what goes on. Cutting down healthy trees is not on anyone’s agenda that I know. It’ll be ‘enough with the trees already’ when the city leaves them alone.”

“I THINK THE TREE ACTIVISTS SHOULD continue with their crusade. They should go as far as they need to until the City Council sees the errors in their ways. While they may not respond to the environmental impacts in terms of urban deforestation, I think that they might rethink that they will not attract more shoppers to Second and Fourth streets by removing the shade. I think profits is what’s behind their development plan, but with the public outcry, I’m hopeful the city will come around and give the people what they want — to leave the healthy trees in their place. They’re old-growth 40-year-old trees, and it’s not necessary to cut them down and transplant them. They’re quite beautiful as they are.”

“I THINK THOSE TREES ON SECOND AND Fourth streets should be cut down, sidewalks repaired and new beautiful trees — like on Broadway — replacing them. There’s plenty of shade on Broadway after one of two years. Second and Fourth street are two of the ugli-est streets in the downtown district because of those trees. They make it much too dark, much too dirty and the sidewalks are much too broken up.”

“I BELIEVE THE TREE ACTIVISTS WILL prevail in their attempt to save these beautiful trees. They can go as far as they imagine with this. The word is out and people are joining forces in the thrust to do what is morally right.”

“I THINK IT SHOULD GO UNTIL IT’S gonna be a full-fledged legal battle. The Council does not represent the people.”

*Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on October 13, 2007.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/101307.pdf?ref=smdp.com)