New York Trees Cost $33,000 Each
Chalk this one up to “things that the MTA is over-spending on”: A temporary ramp at the RFK/Triborough bridge is requiring the MTA to cut down sixteen trees. And the Parks Department is apparently very displeased about it: In a bit of stunning inter-municipal pettiness, Parks is charging $33,000 per tree to remove and replant the saplings. Everyone loses: trees, MTA, and taxpayers.
The agency, according to the New York Post, is counting the tree’s square inches as the total replacement cost. So they’re charging $520,550 total in order to make up for the total mass of the trees destroyed. Remind me why we need the subway fares to go up again?
“It certainly is a waste of money,” MTA board member Jonathan Ballan told the Post. Yeah. You could say that.