the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, while the Village of Ridgewood contemplates clear cutting trees at Schedler Park to put in a turf baseball field adjacent to Route 17 , the Borough of Westwood has received the “Tree City ” designation .
The Borough of Westwood earned the recognition as a 2022 Tree City USA! The Westwood Shade Tree Advisory Committee is committed to providing guidance on the planting, maintenance, education and preservation of all Borough trees. Westwood Arbor Fest Tree Planting Celebration, where the borough will be planting trees over the course of 5 days: April 25 – 29th.
Westwood Mayor Ray Arroyo remarked on Facebook , “Overdevelopment, invasive insect infestations, disease , the withering of nature’s elements and time…are all conspirators in the degradation of our precious shade tree infrastructure. It’s easy to take the trees for granted and to assume they will always be here sheltering us, our homes and public outdoor spaces. But we seldom miss that which
we take for granted …until it’s gone. The volunteer members of Westwood’s Shade Tree Committee are working to spare us that regret.
Kudos to them all.”
Westwood used to be the poor man’s Ridgewood.
Now Westwood is much more desirable than Ridgewood by a long shot.
keep dreaming . we moved here from westwood. nice town, nice people, but the schools suck.
Surprise!
Schools suck here too… along with everything else.
Good for them! We are going to have the best soccer and baseball players!
What’s amazing to us is that the village always produced great sport teams. And that was without turf old fashion grass think about that no lighting, nothing special. No people are too sensitive.
its no longer about competence bc we don’t want to offend anyone… so
everyone gets a trophy
This council wants to cut down all of those beautiful mature trees on the Schedler land, trees that provide a natural barrier from the highway to that area of town because their one goal is produce their regulation turf field despite the pleas of concerned citizens that have cited numerous health related implications of artificial turf and particulates coming off the highway, safety as the roads are very narrow and environmental concerns related to having a natural barrier for those living within a close proximity and also the fact that numerous homes rely on well water, which will become contaminated from the many chemicals that will drain into their water supply. But no one cares about that and if you ask someone who supports the large regulation field they are blinded to hearing anything to the contrary. So the Village will hire their lawyer at an expense to the Village residents, all so they can implement the plan they have likely been working on for quite a while while making promises to the sporting community. So while they will butcher the Schedler land, Ridgewood’s very own Shade Tree Commission (STC) will just go plant more somewhere else. The STC is supposed to preserve, protect, and enhance the village’s trees along and educate the community about the contribution shade trees make to the Village environment and increase the number of trees in the village by actively promoting community tree planting programs. I guess the East side of Ridgewood doesn’t matter as much with the many fabulous initiatives that apply to Ridgewood proper.