The area of Redbud Woods is a small parcel of land on the edge of Cornell University. People may be wondering, why the tempest in a teacup about the plan to remove an overgrown greenspace and replace it with a 176 space parking lot? And certainly, why be concerned with this on a day when Rove's behavior should still be front and center and the president has nominated a staunch anti-choice candidate for the Supreme Court? The reason is that, in the grand scheme of things, and especially in environmental work, small matters. More below the flip.
Professor Thomas Eisner, Cornell's eminent entymologist and an opponent of the parking lot, noted that in the work of environmental conservation, many of the critical battles being fought are fought for very small pieces of land: a pond here, a green space there. If we are to start disregarding ecological battles based on size, we have already lost the environmental sustainability movement.
This morning, with protesters still in trees in the back of the lot, and a hunger striker removed just hours before, a bulldozer moved into the site and began clearing trees. Some (a grand total of twelve we are told by Vice President of Student Affairs and one of the parking lots staunchest supporters, Susan Murphy) were to be "harvested." On a clear blue crisp day in Ithaca, Ithaca residents came out to watch in horror as the bulldozer knocked down a large number of the trees in a matter of minutes. They were tipped over by the arm of the bulldozer and then dragged by machine to the chipper to be chipped. Anyone watching now has an idea of how quickly forested lands can be cleared and destroyed. It is an image one can never forget.
The small matters, and one more piece of historic green space, on the former home of the founder of New York State's park system, Robert Treman, is now a bulldozed mess awaiting its asphalt surface, called by the community, "Hunter's Ass Fault" in honor of the intransigent university president, Hunter Rawlings III, who could have turned this around and chose not to, lest changing one's mind in the face of overwhelming opposition and evidence be construed as "weak."
Small matters. Redbud Woods is gone. But a powerful movement of faculty, student and town activists is springing up to fight the larger battles for sustainability and accountability at an Ivy League university which tarnished its reputation for ecological studies --for 176 parking spaces.