In order to accommodate a new golf course, 60-year-old oak trees are being moved yards away using a slow pulley system in a process that began nine months ago. A representative of the company that designed the pulley system estimated that the total weight of the root ball, steel plate and one of the trees for transport is about 80 tons.
A new golf course at New Orleans City Park is still a couple of years away, and gradual work to accommodate that space in the current East-West golf course is underway as crews slowly move live oak trees using a pulley system, Fox 8 WVUE New Orleans reported.
“The process started about nine months ago,” said John Benton of Bayou Tree Services. “The actual speed is probably a foot every minute, and we’re using a new technique where we’re actually skidding and not lifting them with a crane.”
A newly designed golf course has been in the works since Hurricane Katrina. City Park CEO Bob Becker said the money is finally in place after dealing with FEMA over damages sustained in the storm, WVUE reported.
“This course has been designed around trying to maximize the oak trees,” Becker said.
Some trees had to be moved to fit the new design. A 60-year-old live oak is being moved just a few yards away, although it seems like miles, WVUE reported.
“The total weight with the root ball and the plate and the tree is about 80 tons,” said Cody Lawrence of Davie Shoring, the company that designed the plate system for the heavy slide. “The pulley system is slow, and if we can get some traction with the truck, we’ll spin it around and drive it on down to the stakes over there.”
The area that will be transformed into the revamped golf course used to be a Cypress swamp, where oak trees couldn’t grow. In the late 1930s and early 40s, that changed when workers with the President Franklin Roosevelt’s WPA filled the swamp and planted seedlings. Those seedlings grew into the big oak trees that are being moved, WVUE reported.
“What you see out here is reclaimed. It’s manmade, all the trees replanted,” said Becker.
Tell Us What You Think!
You must be logged in to post a comment.