Why Be Concerned?

The words matter because they help decide whether a mature tree stays or goes. The adopted Master Street Tree Plan already requires evaluation of preservation alternatives. The Gibbons plan must make that obligation testable at each location.

Please join us in insisting on clear, written, measurable criteria that prioritize safe sidewalks and retaining the existing mature canopy. Each rejected option should identify the criterion it fails, the measurements and evidence supporting that finding, and why a modified design or combination of options cannot solve the problem.

An option that has not been properly investigated should remain unresolved. A checklist marked “considered” does not show that preservation options have been exhausted.

Why these definitions matter · City response — August 21, 2026

Why the wording matters

At the May community meetings, 75% of first-choice votes favored the lowest removal option offered: 10% every five years. The 25% removal rate received 0%. In July, staff recommended the 25% removal rate and described that lowest available option of 10% as having “slightly more community support.”  After the community showed strong opposition, the city revised its proposal to the current 20% of remaining trees every five years, doubling their offered rate that received overwhelming community support. Require clear standards, a reviewable record, and no double-talk at every step.

May voting record · July presentation

The October draft calls for a site-specific report before an infrastructure-related removal. The plan should require that report to show how every preservation option was assessed against the adopted criteria, including relevant new technology and combinations of options. And why each of those options or combination of options fails to save a healthy tree and secure safe sidewalks. 

The Master Street Tree Plan and current Tree Removal Policy identify these options:
• Modify the curb while providing adequate drainage for the entire block.
• Reduce sidewalk width near trees while meeting accessibility requirements.
• Meander the sidewalk.
• Ramp the sidewalk.
• Reduce curb width.
• Use curb breaks.
• Prune or shave roots.
• New technology, including methods identified in the draft Urban Forest Plan - steel root plates shown to be effective over periods of more than 25 years, diamond plates that cities like Berkeley are successfully using with traction to provide additional root space, and combinations of options being used successfully by Seattle and other cities. 

For each option, publish the site conditions, investigation, design, tree impacts and reason for retaining or rejecting it. Explain any finding that an option does not apply or cannot be successful. Evaluate the applicable measures identified in the draft Urban Forest Plan. Continue to require existing safeguards such as the 5% of blockface per year limit and Planning Board review. 

Require qualified arborist and engineering review, City-funded independent review before nonemergency removal, and a meaningful opportunity for residents to respond. Complete that work before removal approval or construction that could foreclose preservation. Publish a signed record showing that the required tree-policy safeguards have been met.

Tree Removal Policy, §D.1 · Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 2, pp. 108–109 · Draft Urban Forest Plan · Current Gibbons plan · See the required options · See examples of sidewalk repairs that preserve mature trees

A removal framework does not give residents a completed sidewalk. The draft sets out repair approaches and priorities, but does not require any linkage to impending sidewalk or infrastructure repair or replanting. Residents need a firm commitment to funded, scheduled work at each location.

Please ask the City to require the repair to be designed, funded, scheduled and ready to proceed before infrastructure-related removal. 

Tree protection and sidewalk repair should be planned together, with preservation reviewed early enough to enable a design that achieves it.

A tree-removal framework is not a sidewalk-repair plan · Current draft — cost, funding and location-by-location process

The draft acknowledges that mature-tree removal results in the opposite goals of the adopted City policies such as the Climate Action and Resiliency Plan 2 (CARP2), the Climate Change Emergency Resolution, and the draft Urban Forest Plan endorsed by these documents. Removal of this connected canopy will dramatically reduce shade, cooling, stormwater interception, air-quality benefits, stored carbon and habitat. It also acknowledges that the proposed (but not planned or quantified) replacement plantings will not restore the existing benefits.

The next step is to measure what the proposed decisions would take away. Establish a canopy baseline for the corridor, calculate the loss from previous removals plus each newly proposed removal, and compare that cumulative loss with a written protective limit before approving more removals. But the City has said no such calculations exist, suggests it has no way of estimating worst case impacts given its proposed location-by-location approach with no replanting plan, and is also declaring its actions here as exempt from CEQA. 

The accounting for material and estimable negative impacts must continue across whatever plan is adopted, even location-by-location, showing the cumulative impact of these decisions. This should include the time needed for new canopy to develop and address uncertainties about where replacement trees for each location could be planted and survive. A tree trunk count is a significantly different measure than the mature, connected canopy vital to so many benefits. 

Current Gibbons draft · City response — August 21, 2026 · December 2025 arborist report

The October draft does not establish one-for-one replacement or a total number of replacement trees. It acknowledges many trees will not be replaced, says planting opportunities depend on available space, says they will be evaluated as individual locations are addressed, and that they will "attempt" to provide one tree per home or every forty feet. An attempt is not a commitment to assessment, funding or action. 

Before adopting a long-term removal framework, please ask the City to show where replacement planting can actually occur under this framework, what canopy AND tree replacement it can reasonably provide over time, what the impact will be on canopy and the vitally different connected canopy, and how planting and establishment care will be funded.

A promised replacement needs a meaningful mature size and a viable place to grow.

Current draft — Tree Planting · City response — August 20, 2026 · Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 2 — spacing appendix · Where can replacement trees actually be planted?

A tree-by-tree process can identify a local sidewalk problem. It must also account for what successive removals do to the canopy as a whole.

Gibbons’ connected crowns provide habitat across the corridor. Wildlife needs more than protection of an active nest on the day work occurs. Please require the plan to address habitat connections, cover and other habitat functions throughout the year - not just an active nest that happens to be observed before a tree's irreversible removal.

Measure cumulative canopy loss before each proposed removal and assess whether the resulting gaps would break important connections. Adopt corridor-wide safeguards alongside the assessment of each tree.

A corridor-wide habitat needs a corridor-wide plan · December 2025 arborist report · Current Gibbons plan

The proposed cap is 20% of the Liquidambars remaining at the start of each five-year period. The City says it is a maximum, not a target or a removal schedule. The draft says all Liquidambar removals count, including losses unrelated to planned sidewalk work.

That limit counts trees. It does not establish how much mature canopy may be lost, where gaps may form, or when replacement canopy would recover.

Please require a cumulative canopy limit and a clear explanation of how the Gibbons framework relates to the existing Master Street Tree Plan block-face removal safeguards. Each individual removal still needs to pass the preservation and review requirements.

Current draft — five-year cap and unanticipated removals · Tree Removal Policy · Proposed resolution

The City’s December 2025 arborist report rated 88 of the 117 assessed sweetgums Good, 24 Fair and five Poor. The City reports that the five Poor trees were removed in April 2026. The report describes the mature population as being in “remarkably good condition”, unusually successful for its setting, while identifying real maintenance and infrastructure challenges.

Some defects in Fair-rated trees can be treated. Trees labeled as unhealthy in 2010 are identified as healthy in the latest arborist report. A health label alone should not decide whether preservation options are investigated. Require a qualified diagnosis, assessment of treatment and retention options, and independent review before a nonemergency removal is approved.

Please require funded care for retained mature trees, following qualified arborist recommendations, and protection during investigation and construction.

The oldest trees are estimated to be about 100 years old. The arborist says these trees have lived only 40% - 80% of their natural lifespan, and have “the potential to thrive for many more years.” 

December 2025 arborist report · Current Gibbons plan · What the assessment says about tree health · Mark Douglas Minor’s submitted historical nomination and history

Alameda already has preservation and review requirements. A Gibbons-specific plan should show how it strengthens those protections at the point when actual trees and repair designs are considered.

The accompanying resolution proposes exempting future removals under the Gibbons plan from further Planning Board review. It says other applicable Tree Removal Policy requirements would continue.

Please ask the Board to retain project-specific review, complete supporting records, broad notice and enough time for residents to work with the City to obtain an independent opinion, and use an effective appeal before irreversible work. Require work to pause when a mandatory safeguard has not been met or protected review remains pending.

Proposed resolution, pp. 2–3 · Tree Removal Policy · What does the City’s plan actually require it to do?

The draft recognizes the value of the existing canopy. Please ask for a baseline, a running calculation of losses, and a written limit that changes the decision before the next removal is approved.

The calculation should show the canopy retained, the loss from removals, the expected recovery from planting and the gaps that affect connected habitat. Tree counts and replacement promises cannot provide those measurements on their own.

Climate Action & Resiliency Plan · Draft Urban Forest Plan · Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 1 · Vol. 2 · City response — August 21, 2026 · December 2025 arborist report

A young tree cannot provide today’s mature canopy on planting day. These trees took generations to grow. The City’s own draft acknowledges the immediate loss of environmental benefits and the time needed for replacement trees to grow.

The plan must also show where new trees can fit under planting and infrastructure rules, and how they will be watered and cared for. Measure the canopy and habitat lost in the meantime, not just the number of trees planted.

Replacement planting matters. Preserving the canopy that already does this work matters now.

Can you find the replacement tree? · Another replacement-tree example · Where can a replacement actually be planted? · Current Gibbons plan · City response — August 20, 2026 · Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 2

How do sidewalk age, construction and maintenance contribute to the problem?

Some sidewalk sections have been here alongside the trees for generations—old enough to qualify for Social Security, if they were people. A resident’s meticulous photo records document concrete dates, nearby addresses and observed condition. Comparing those observations with the City’s sidewalk maps and HortScience inventory gives a fuller picture of the repair problem.

The community comparison includes older concrete still rated Fair, newer concrete rated Poor, and repaired sidewalks functioning beside large mature trees. Those differences call for investigation of construction, drainage, maintenance and repair history as well as roots. Which repairs have worked, and can those methods preserve trees at other locations?

Please ask the City to explain the condition and repair options at each location before proposing tree removal. The need to repair a damaged sidewalk does not alone establish that the tree must go.

Maria van Lieshout’s sidewalk date-stamp survey and photographs (PDF) · Community comparison with City sidewalk ratings and the HortScience inventory (PDF)

City maps and sidewalk details · 1400–1500 block map · 2900 block map · 3000–3100 block map · December 2025 arborist report

The Master Street Tree Plan and current Tree Removal Policy already require consideration of preservation alternatives. Please help make those commitments effective through measurable criteria, complete site-specific evidence and review before irreversible work.

The draft Urban Forest Plan and adopted climate plan provide additional context for preservation, canopy and infrastructure decisions. The Gibbons plan should show how its requirements carry those commitments through to each location and to the corridor as a whole.

Tree Removal Policy — current procedures · Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 1 · Vol. 2 — includes the historical policy reproduction · Draft Urban Forest Plan · Adopted Climate Action & Resiliency Plan · Climate Emergency Declaration, Resolution No. 15510

What the August responses covered

The City’s August responses document what had—and had not—been analyzed at that time, including canopy impacts, replacement capacity and the basis for the removal framework. The October draft adds discussion, cost comparisons and a decision process. The questions above examine the measurements and binding safeguards still needed.

City response — August 20, 2026 · City response — August 21, 2026

What the cost comparison assumes

The cost comparison assumes approximately 100 removals over a 50-year planning period. The City identifies that as an estimating assumption, not a removal target or prediction. However, all of the city's future state assumptions presume full removal of the mature trees currently in the Gibbons Drive corridor.

The cost estimate does not establish how much mature canopy will be preserved or when the sidewalks will be repaired. The plan needs enforceable commitments on both.

City cost estimates — August 5, 2026 · City response — August 31, 2026 · Current Gibbons plan

Community survey: August 31 snapshot

This was a voluntary, self-selected survey, not a scientific sample of Alameda. As of August 31, 85 people had responded. Among respondents:

• 95.2% said the City should evaluate and publicly present reasonable alternatives before removing mature trees.

• 89.3% definitely or probably supported additional investment to preserve the canopy.

• 66.7% said the City had not provided enough opportunity for community input.

Of the 17 Gibbons residents who answered the property-impact question, 82.4% would allow sidewalk meandering several feet onto their property, and 94.1% would accept some on-street parking removal to preserve healthy mature trees.

Community Survey - Key Responses as of Aug. 31, 2026

The survey began when the earlier 25%-per-five-year proposal was under consideration. Questions about 25% refer to that proposal. The City later revised the proposed cap to 20% of remaining trees.

How to read the earlier illustrations

The May drawings illustrate historical concepts. They do not show a current schedule, forecast the later 20%-of-remaining proposal or establish that every tree would disappear within twenty years.

Historical May 2026 conceptual removal illustrations

Photograph and illustrative comparison

Existing streetscape photograph

AI-generated illustration of the same section without trees

The AI-generated image illustrates a visual change. It is not a measured forecast.

Original survey and meeting archive

The original community survey remains available for reference. Its questions about 25% describe the earlier proposal, not the October draft. For the October 14 Commission meeting, use the Commission email below.

City meeting presentations and feedback archive · Earlier linked copy of Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 2

March 2026 meeting feedback · Earlier meeting feedback and presentations · August 2026 letter to Gibbons Drive residents

What about bridging, different materials and root plates?

A raised or bridged sidewalk can carry the walking surface above roots where the site permits. Flexible or alternative surfaces, compliant local realignment, curb changes and careful root work may be useful singly or together. The Master Street Tree Plan also discusses material changes and root-management methods; the draft Urban Forest Plan identifies bridging and suspended pavement among corridor design tools.

“Root plate” can describe different systems. A plate intended to restrain root growth is not the same as a structural bridge supporting pavement over roots. Require product-specific evidence, drawings, installation constraints, maintenance needs and effects on the tree. An installation elsewhere is a reason to investigate, not a guarantee that it will work for decades on Gibbons.

Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 2, printed p. 99 · Draft Urban Forest Plan: corridor design options

The sidewalk evidence: look at the location

The City’s published summary lists eight sidewalk locations with “No Damage” and eight curb locations with “No Damage.” These are separate totals; they do not establish that the same eight locations had neither type of damage. The summary describes July 2025 assessment data and excludes later repairs beside the five removed trees.

Other locations have serious damage. The important finding is variation: the amount of uplift, root geometry, drainage and repair options differ from site to site. The October draft itself explains that a severely displaced slab may involve roots that can be pruned safely, while a smaller displacement may involve a structural root that cannot.

A mature tree beside sound pavement is worth investigating. So is a successful repair beside a retained tree. Record the design, age, root work and maintenance before treating either example as proof. Sidewalk age alone does not diagnose the cause of damage or determine the right repair.

City maps and the sidewalk/curb summary · Arborist assessment and repair discussion

Keeping a tree also means caring for it

The City-commissioned arborist recommended slow-rate drip irrigation near the dripline, better soil and rooting conditions, mulch, and further investigation of bulb-outs, modified street sections and meandering sidewalks. Ask which recommendations are funded, who will implement them and how results will be checked. The report is evidence of the recommendations; it does not establish that the City has ignored them.

Arborist maintenance recommendations, printed pp. 6–7

What Alameda’s other plans can teach Gibbons

No two streets are twins. The useful comparison is whether Alameda applies the same care to defining the problem, investigating alternatives and protecting canopy—not whether every street receives the same design.

• Park and Webster: the draft Urban Forest Plan discusses curb bulbs, bridging, suspended pavement and alternative streetscape designs in constrained commercial corridors. These are examples of tools to evaluate, not proof that the same design fits residential Gibbons.

• Central and Bay Farm: the draft plan calls for further analysis of underperforming London planes and attention to canopy during replacement. That is a study-first principle; the tree-health problem differs from Gibbons.

• Clement and Fernside: the adopted Master Street Tree Plan considers changes to planting space and street geometry. The existing curb line is a design choice to examine, not automatically the final word.

• Park Street’s replacement lesson: the draft Urban Forest Plan records 31 mature trees removed in 2011 with 60 replacements intended, while many replacements still provide much less canopy. Doubling a planting count did not even equal the shade.

Draft Urban Forest Plan, Neighborhood and Corridor Assessment · Master Street Tree Plan, Vol. 2: street-specific plans

The City’s arborist estimates that the oldest sweetgums were planted as the Fernside neighborhood developed, about a century ago. Mark Douglas Minor’s historic-corridor nomination brings together a local historical account and the case for recognizing this landscape.

City project page and current draft · Current draft plan PDF · October 12 Planning Board item, staff report and attachments · Proposed resolution · City Tree Removal Policy

The proposed resolution asks the City to find the plan exempt from CEQA review. Please ask the City to substantiate that finding in light of cumulative canopy loss, connected habitat and the effects described in its own draft.

Earlier October 2026 attachments: formatted draft · unformatted draft. Use the City project page above for the currently posted version.

If the email button does not open your email app, copy the recipients, subject and message below into a new email. Add your own words before sending.

To:

ada@alamedaca.gov

Cc:

ljewell@alamedaca.gov

Subject:

October 14 - Safe, accessible sidewalks and mature Gibbons trees

Message:

Dear Commissioners,

People with disabilities deserve safe, accessible sidewalks and the shade, beauty, cleaner air and protection from heat that this mature canopy provides. Everyone should be able to enjoy this green corridor. Small replacement trees cannot provide the existing canopy’s benefits today.

Please return the Gibbons draft for more work, as the Planning Board did Monday evening, and require revisions that commit to safe access and mature-tree preservation. Please require the revised plan to return to this Commission for public review before any recommendation to City Council. A tree-removal framework is not a sidewalk-repair plan: it does not tell residents which accessibility barriers will be fixed, when, or with what funding.

Please require:

• A framework specifying how needed sidewalk repairs will be identified, assessed and prioritized, and how funding will be provided.

• Repairs designed, funded and scheduled before infrastructure-related removal, with safe access during construction.

• Clear, measurable definitions of feasible, reasonable, practical and possible.

• Documented assessment of every applicable tree-preserving option, including new technologies and combinations of measures, and evidence that those options have been exhausted before nonemergency removal approval.

• Independent review before roots are damaged, continued Planning Board review before irreversible work, and protection of cumulative canopy and connected wildlife habitat.

[Add a sentence about what matters to you.]

Please distribute this comment to all commissioners and include it in the public record for the October 14 meeting.

[Your name]