San Franciscans behaving badly, again.
Environmental destruction edition.
Only the entitled Swells can afford to litigate their way through the judicial system and get a Court ordered destruction of a beautiful environmentally friendly tree.
The worst part of it is the tree destroyer is in her 80’s. One would think that age would make even San Francisco Swells more magnanimous. Sadly not.
Excerpted from San Francisco Chronicle 9.23.2021
Trees are among nature’s wonders — but a neighbor’s growing arbor can also eliminate a resident’s treasured scenic views. Now a state appeals court, relying on a San Francisco ordinance that seeks to resolve treetop feuds, has ordered a Pacific Heights couple to take down a sprouting Monterey pine that stands between their next-door neighbor’s home and the bay.
The neighbor, now 81, moved into the San Francisco home with her now-deceased husband in 1976 and testified that they chose the site largely because of its unobstructed view of San Francisco Bay, the Golden Gate Bridge, Angel Island and lands to the north. The pine was planted next door by a prior resident in 1999 and, by the time the case went to trial in 2019, had grown to 30 to 32 feet, with widening, thickly growing branches.
“The tree’s rapid growth in both height and breadth obstructs the views of landmarks and vistas that could once be seen” from the neighbor’s ground floor, Superior Court Judge Jeffrey Ross, who had visited the site during the non-jury trial, said in a December 2019 order to remove the pine under San Francisco’s 1988 Tree Dispute Resolution Ordinance.
In a ruling Wednesday upholding Ross’ order, the First District Court of Appeal said the city has the authority, under state law, “to resolve tree view obstruction disputes between adjoining landowners,” as it seeks to do in its ordinance.
Lee's Perspective 