On-campus construction strikes again, and again...

The University of Montana should no longer be able to use its beautiful campus as a tool for recruitment. Instead, I’d like to see a pamphlet for incoming freshmen that describes the scene on campus as “never-ending construction, detours nearly a football field in length and a shrinking number of trees.”

For those of you who are a little out of the loop, the construction in the southwest quadrant of the Oval is for the Native American Center, which is scheduled to be completed by spring 2010.

The center won’t be built on the Oval but on the grassy area between the Mathematics Building, the International Center and the Lommasson Center. Part of the Oval is fenced off to protect the construction company’s equipment and materials.

Missoula is a city that prides itself on open space, but that doesn’t seem to carry over to UM, which is (ironically) the home of the Montana State Arboretum. However, as part of the Native American Center construction, five trees will be cut down.

I understand construction is a necessary evil – but when is enough, enough?

First it was the ongoing steam tunnel construction, then Don Anderson Hall, the Interdisciplinary Science Building, the addition to the Law School, and the expansion of Washington-Grizzly Stadium that closed down Campus Drive last semester.

Now, it’s the Native American Center and next, it’s going to be a 15-foot-wide cement sidewalk through Memorial Grove in front of McGill Hall, the Gilkey Executive Education Center in front of the Gallagher Business Building and the Washington Education Center addition to the Education Building.

What’s happening to all the open space on campus, and more importantly, what’s going to happen to all the trees?

Jameel Chaudhry, the UM Project Manager of the Oval Restoration Plan, said seven trees in addition to the five being removed to make way for the Native American Center will be cut down to promote conformity on campus.

Wait a second – conformity ... of trees? Isn’t the fact that they’re green and tall conforming enough? Do they have to get cut down just to be replaced with “conforming” oak trees and sugar maples?

In a place that brags about its beautiful campus and the fact that it is the Montana State Arboretum, I don’t think removing anything green is a good idea.

Sure, you can argue they’ll grow back, but it took a hundred years for some of the trees on campus to get as tall as they did. When people started cutting down the rainforests, environmentalists didn’t let them off the hook when they said “It’ll grow back,” did they? 

But signs of nature are slowly disappearing under concrete sidewalks and tall buildings on the UM campus. And in 100 years, when those oak trees and sugar maples get as tall as the ones currently on campus, they’ll probably be the only trees left.

So much for getting a beautiful picture of my family and me standing on the Oval at my graduation this spring.

-Virginia J. Cleaveland, news editor
virginia.cleaveland@umontana.edu