Returning students and faculty noticed changes to the scenery on campus conducted over the summer. The most noticeable change being the removal of many trees in front of the Jenkins Building facing Fifth Street.
“I like this campus because of the greenery and the scenery and the foliage,” Sophomore Angie Romero said.
The Facilities and Construction Department primarily removed a species of Water Oak due to safety concerns. These trees have a lifespan of about 30 years or so until they start to die or hollow out.
“Typically, Water Oaks are short-lived – 30 or 50 years. Those trees were planted in the late 40s and early 50s. If you do the math they were getting past their cycle of life,” said Mark Gartman, director of facilities and construction.
After severe storms struck the TJC campus this past year, it seems the trees became a safety hazard.
“Really there was only one determining factor,” Gartman said. “The determining factor was the safety, security and wellbeing of our faculty, staff, students and guests. The trees were dangerous.”
One storm in April caused a campuswide shutdown due to a lack of power, but also a concern for safety. Tree limbs blocked pathways and buildings on campus, and after the storm ended, some limbs were still falling.
“A two-inch limb is a very dangerous limb falling from 40 or 50 feet in the air,” Gartman said.
Students enjoyed their summer break from classes, but that didn’t mean the weather took a vacation, as well.
Wind storms revealed internal tree safety concerns such as hollowed trunks. Older trees deemed unsafe were removed from campus.
“We had a windstorm here —probably June or maybe May. We had a very big windstorm that came through here. Damaged some of our roofs, damaged the greenhouse between Rogers Student Center and Vaughn Conservatory,” Gartman said. “That was all because of tree damage. We had trees that fell over. We had 14-inch limbs that broke off, and once we started picking that stuff up, we saw that they were hollow.”
Hollow limbs are a sign of disease in trees and being hollowed out also makes the tree much more likely to break off and fall during wind. The unpredictability became too much of a safety hazard for the students, staff, faculty and visitors of TJC, so the administration made the decision to remove them.
“We get that it’s like a safety issue,” Romero said. “ I just wish they would plant more.”
But overturned soil is not the only landscape in TJC’s future. The Facilities and Construction Department plans to regrow the grass around old tree stumps to smooth out the landscape before continuing onto other landscaping projects.
“The plan is to restore our front lawn and start growing the grass for greenery,” Gartman said. “We’ll start placing trees in hollow spaces where there needs to be a tree, we’ll start putting trees there.”
The future landscape is in the hands of the Facilities and Construction Department mainly, but this department leans on volunteers during events like Arbor Day. Arbor Day is a tree-planting day centered around finding the best place to plant trees and how to best keep the environment healthy. TJC has participated in Arbor Day through its Keep TJC beautiful committee since 2017.
Since participating in Arbor Day, Gartman said, “we’ve planted over 200 trees on this campus, so I feel comfortable that in the future our campus will return to its one-time beautiful look.”
To learn more about plans for the grounds of TJC or to get involved in projects like Arbor Day, join the Student Senate for their first committee meeting. Follow TJC Student Senate on Instagram for meeting times and information.
