Parrish neighborhood protests tree removal along Fort Hamer Road

PARRISH -- Earth moving machinery that came in last week to clear brush and trees along a mile of Fort Hamer Road stirred up residents of the Chelsea Oaks subdivision.

"This is a mess," resident David Wellette said, as he stood at the entrance of Chelsea Oaks and looked across the road at the bare earth where oak trees and palms once stood.

"These were large oaks, two or three feet in diameter, palms, just pure shade. It also affects the privacy of River Wilderness. It affects everybody in the neighborhood," Wellette said.

Jim Begg, a board member of the Chelsea Oaks home owner association, said about 40 residents have approached him with complaints about the tree removal.

"Now we don't have the shade and the county has to go through the additional expense of landscaping," Begg said. "I was surprised and shocked that all these trees were destroyed."

Joggers and walkers were still using the sidewalk on the other side of a silt fence Thursday, but the shade was gone.

"It used to be that a group of soccer moms would walk down to the river and back, but you don't see them any more," Begg said, estimating there were once hundreds of trees along the one-mile stretch of road. "It had pristine southern charm and now it's gone."

Work is being done to Fort Hamer Road and Upper Manatee River as part of the $32.69 million project to build a bridge over the Manatee River at Fort Hamer. Ground was broken in March 2015, and the project should be completed by early 2017.

"Every effort has been made to save as many trees as possible and the removal of certain trees is included in the design plans," Trudy Gerena, spokeswoman for the project, said Thursday.

Fort Hamer Road is being widened by 10-feet in that area to better accommodate vehicle traffic, and to add bike lanes on both sides of the road. The road shoulder needed to be cleared to allow for drainage, she said.

An estimated 180 to 200 trees, a mix of palms, scrub oaks, and other oak tree, were removed north of River Isle to Mulholland Road along Fort Hamer Road, Gerena said.

James A. Jones Jr., East Manatee reporter, can be contacted at 941-745-7053 and on Twitter@jajones1.

This story was originally published February 5, 2016 at 2:05 PM with the headline "Parrish neighborhood protests tree removal along Fort Hamer Road ."