- Thursday, April 30th, 2009
- Posted by: Athena Lo
- Category: Building, Design, Material Alternatives, Salvage, Wood
Tags: Architecture, ash, Furniture, lumber, maple, urban forest, wwod
Utilizing The Urban Forest (Fallen Trees = Lumber)
When a tree falls in the city, where does it go? More than likely, it is made into firewood or mulch, but it could be utilized as hardwood lumber thereby saving old growth trees and forests. These trees fall for various reasons ranging from storms, old age, insects or construction, but we could use this lumber for furniture, building, cabinets, and even paper products.
According to Stephen Bratkovich, a forest products specialist with the USDA Forest Service, using these trees could satisfy 30 percent of the country’s hardwood needs. Really all we need is someone to mill them into lumber. Bruce and Erica Horigan have a mill, Horigan Urban Forest Products, just North of Chicago and say “we are committed to the environment by reducing the number of trees removed from the forest, the amount of fuel consumed for transportation, and the amount of carbon that is released into the atmosphere by sequestering it as hardwood lumber. ”
The wood produced is very beautiful, has character, and the user knows exactly where it came from. This chair was made from an Ash tree that was infested with the dreaded Emerald Ash Borer, a wood eating beetle. Also recently, a synagogue in Evanston, IL used the maple trees cut down in construction for the new building.
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