Smith<\/a> is an original member of the group that became the Memorial Park Conservancy and the founding president of Save Buffalo Bayou<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Many of us remember the shocking impact of the years of droughts on our beloved Memorial Park. The record dry spell in 2011 killed<\/a> more than half the trees in the 1,500-acre park on Buffalo Bayou. Scores of distraught Houstonians were moved to raise funds and plant new trees<\/a>.<\/p>\n But now hundreds of trees, including towering pines and oaks, are being deliberately felled as part of a $200 to $300 million landscaping plan<\/a>. Anyone walking in the park or even driving through can plainly see the bright plastic ribbons wrapped around the trunks of the legions of trees facing imminent doom on both sides of Memorial Drive.<\/p>\n Many more trees still unmarked are to be cut down on the west side of the park to make way for sports facilities, a relocated Memorial Drive and, in an unhappy irony, an ecologically damaging monoculture of pines to be planted in unnaturally regimented rows as a memorial to those who served in World War I.<\/p>\n As though this were not disturbing enough, the landscaping plan includes creating artificial streams<\/a> and hardening them with wire, concrete rubble and \u201crock\u201d of some sort.<\/p>\n Mature pines felled north of Memorial Drive for land bridges. Photo by SC Jan. 24, 2019<\/p><\/div>\n The Beauty of Memorial Park<\/strong><\/p>\n The unique beauty of Memorial Park and its distinctive benefit to Houstonians has been its forests and clear, sand-bottomed streams flowing through deep, winding ravines to Buffalo Bayou. This is part of Houston\u2019s natural history, and this great public park offers our city residents the rare opportunity to experience the wonder of these living trees and streams.<\/p>\n I have been involved with Memorial Park for more than 50 years. Before she died in 1975, I promised my friend Ima Hogg that I would always be a guardian of the natural character of the park. Miss Ima\u2019s family sold the land for the park, previously a World War I training camp,<\/a> to the city at cost in 1924.<\/p>\n There are admirable aspects of the current master plan for the park \u2014 notably the Eastern Glades<\/a> and the \u201cnaturalization\u201d of what are now ball fields south of Memorial Drive, facilities that will be moved to the north. However, a previous plan from 2004<\/a>, approved by City Council, was less intrusive and more respectful of the character of the park. It described the park as \u201cHouston\u2019s foremost natural wooded bayou park\u201d and \u201ca refuge from intense urbanization.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.savebuffalobayou.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/03\/Tree-pile.jpg\")
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