Letter to the editor: 

My biases: community  health and safety supersede all other considerations, and public policy decisions must address  not only this but  also future generations. Form follows function: Church street is a thoroughfare, not a driveway for CMU faculty and staff.  Parking on campus should prioritize visitors, faculty  and staff first and students thereafter.  The value of CMU to the community is truly inestimable. Town and gown collaboration and cooperation must always come before competition and criticism.  To suggest that newly planted trees will be more beautiful and appealing to campus visitors approaches the absurd, and disrespects the commitment made by previous generations to provide peace and beauty to those that follow. Public expressions by institutional and civic leaders that are imperious, inflammatory, and threaten rather than accommodate, speak to  the character and integrity of those who share them.  Elected officials have the duty and responsibility to exercise their power such that their grandchildren will respect and benefit from their decisions.  

Occam’s Razor has not dulled with time: the simplest solution is the best solution. Prohibit parking on Church street from  Davis to Cleveland.  Make the parking lot at Elm and Church faculty and staff only. CMU has multiple properties on the  perimeter of campus that are suited to small surface parking lots ( e.g. northeast corner of Elm and Mulberry) and who realistically believes they do not have the resources to take that course?

I also confess to respecting the often unrecognized or ignored inherent value of trees as living, breathing, communicating partners in our community.  

Tony Cook