On the morning of Jan. 17, University of San Francisco students, faculty and staff were surprised to find one of the towering, 80-foot Leyland Cypress trees along Golden Gate Avenue fallen over across the road. The tree had come down the night before, near the Harney Science Center, during heavy rain and wind. Nobody was hurt and no cars were damaged.
Documents and emails obtained by the Foghorn reveal that San Francisco Public Works (SFPW), the office that oversees the city’s infrastructure, did not approve a request by the University to remove the tree two weeks before it fell.
But trees have fallen around campus before...
“It kind of sucked having the tree [w]reck my car since it was my first car that I had personally paid for, and knowing that I wouldn’t be able to get another from my own personal expenses sucked,” Lopez said in an email. “Especially the amount of time it took me to save up for the down payment and monthly payments; I felt [like] it was all thrown down the drain.”