At last week’s city council meeting, Wimberley Independent School District requested the removal of another heritage tree to facilitate the additions and improvements that are part of the 2025 $135M WISD bond program.
Senior Associate Sarah Toronjo of O’Connell Robertson & Associates, Inc., who is providing the Architecture, Engineering and Contract Administration Services for the project, spoke. The request for the removal of the tree was based on a study conducted by Studio 16:19 Landscape Architects of Round Rock and TreeMannSolutions, LLC Certified Arborists of Georgetown.
The tree in question is a 27-inch red oak at the very front of Wimberley High school. It is believed that the tree was planted when the high school was built in 1997, but the Wimberley View was unable to confirm that as of the time of press.
“As a part of the bond program, we are adding a new gym lobby and a new entry onto the gymnasium,” said Toronjo. “In order to make that expansion, we are asking that this tree be removed. Currently, the tree is right up against an existing building. It’s causing some maintenance issues to the building already because of the canopy overhang. We looked if there was a potential opportunity to relocate this tree. Half of the tree’s root zone is currently under another building’s foundation. In order to relocate the tree we would need a much larger area of root zone to ensure its survival.
Mayor Chiles asked, “Are you all pretty sure this is the last time you’re coming to ask for this?”
Brad Sims of Studio 16:19, who are the landscape architects on the project, said, “It’s unfortunate because it appears healthy, but considering the limited amount of space that the root structure has to grow, it’s unfortunate that the best solution is to remove it.”
To provide context as to the necessity of the expansion, WISD Superintendent Dr. Greg Bonewald said, “We value the trees that are on our property and have spent a significant amount of time trying to design the expanded spaces to impact as few as possible. The lobby that we’re talking about is where all of our students and the community enter and exit our main competition gym at the high school. That area was built when the high school served less than half the number of students, and our city population was significantly smaller. Today we have hundreds and hundreds of people who attend events in the gym and the lobby is simply not large enough. It’s also poses a safety challenge to be able to get people in and out of the area in case of emergencies.”
Council member David Cohen said, “Well, I just think that it’s terrible that this is being done, and I’m upset that apparently no serious consideration was given to the possibility of building a lobby that would house the tree. There are other buildings in this country, in this state, where live plants thrive inside closed spaces, and this could be a feather in the cap of the high school to have something like this.”
In response to Cohen, Toronjo said, “the complexity is that there will be significant damage to the tree when demolition and construction takes place around it. The likelihood of it surviving something like that is low. So even if we could design the tree to be a part of the new lobby, which would be amazing, the challenge is the tree’s ability to survive both the demolition and new construction. So we did not necessarily look at that as a realistic, viable option because of that.”
As the discussion continued, Council member Cohen said, “Well, you can tell from my expression that I’m very upset about this. I think it’s tragic that we’re doing this, and I certainly hope mayor’s comment about this being the last time we hear about this is now you don’t come to us again for more heritage tree destruction.”
After a motion, the council approved the request by a vote of three to one, in favor. Council member Cohen voted nay.
