Spalding, Others Plant Trees Along I-90
Visibility can hurt a business. Just ask Spalding Auto Parts Inc.
Seven years ago, when state workers mistakenly chopped down a buffer of trees that hid the wrecking yard from Interstate 90, many citizens blamed the Valley business.
Today, Spalding and other local businesses are working to restore that shield of trees, and its more pleasant appearance.
Employees of Ever-Green Lawn and Tree Care, and Alvin J. Wolff Management Company planted about 60 cottonwood trees along the highway last month. Later this fall, Spalding’s plans to plant a quarter-mile row of pines and firs.
“We want to be good neighbors,” said Russ Spalding, assistant general manager of Spalding Auto.
A third-generation member of the family that owns the business, Spalding is proud of the thousands of crunched and dead automobiles it recycles each year. He’s also well aware it’s not a pretty process.
Spokane-area residents send him letters complaining about the sea of automobiles. Last summer, he received one from Carol Ann Lewis of Liberty Lake.
“I know you are not in the beautifying business,” Lewis wrote, “but won’t you please do something to effectively cover the eyesore…?”
The letter spurred Spalding to contact the state Department of Transportation. He got a permit to plant Douglas firs, grand firs and ponderosa pines between the poplars and cottonwoods already planted there. He’s now waiting for a DOT survey crew to show the company where it can plant the trees. Alvin J. Wolff and Ever-Green used their permit to plant 50 trees last year and 60 more this year. The businesses hope to fill in the last open segment of land next fall.
The trees will take years to grow into the buffer once provided by the 30-foot-tall Austrian pines cut down in 1990. Spalding’s will plant the firs and pines between the existing cottonwoods. They’ll probably use seedlings.
Conifers take longer to grow than deciduous trees, but will provide coverage year-round, Spalding said.
“For us, it’s a 20- to 30-year investment,” he said.
The new trees must be planted outside the clear zone, an area roughly 30 feet wide on each side of the highway.
It was a miscalculation of that clear zone that spelled doom for the original trees. DOT workers thought the pines were too close to the freeway. However, they learned after cutting had begun that their measurements were wrong.
DOT replaced the lost pines with poplars a year later. Unfortunately, many were accidently poisoned in 1995 by runoff from an herbicide treatment of Spalding’s lots. The wrecking yard has since improved its roads and built swales to catch runoff before it reaches the trees.
, DataTimes