GUILDERLAND — As two different projects in town are causing trees to be felled, Supervisor Peter Barber says he has been working with a group of residents to come up with a tree-planting plan.

“I’ve been meeting, off and on, for the past several months now with some concerned residents,” he said.

Barber hopes to get a plan of “best practices” before the town board in late April.

“Far more trees are cut down by single-family homeowners than ever get cut down on state highways or commercial development,” Barber said. “A lot of people get nervous whenever there’s a windstorm …. People are cutting pine trees down left and right on their properties.”

The plan would give Guilderland residents “helpful tools” and “appropriate” trees for planting, he said.

Trees have been cut down over the past week along Route 20 in Guilderland between Devonshire Drive and the public library to make way for a sidewalk, Barber said.

The project underwent the state environmental quality review process two years ago, he said.

Many of the trees that have been removed along that stretch are hickory, and not native to the area, Barber said.

He had walked the stretch with an engineer, Barber said, in an effort to avoid felling old-growth maple and oak trees. However, the sidewalk, which has to be five feet from the pavement on Route 20, is close to a culvert, making it difficult to avoid  tree-cutting, Barber said.

“We just can’t avoid the trees when they’re down near the ravine,” he said.

In places that aren’t up against the ravine, Barber said, there is a 10-foot leeway, which allows for avoiding some trees and also keeps the sidewalk away from busy Route 20.

Asked if the town would replant in areas where the trees had been taken down, Barber said that the felled trees were all in the state Department of Transportation’s right-of-way where the town has no jurisdiction.

The second project, undertaken by National Grid, is about two miles west of the library on Route 20, running along Route 146 towards Guilderland Center.

The project is part of National Grid’s regular upgrade and maintenance program for natural gas service in upstate New York, according to National Grid spokesman Patrick Stella. “This is a new pipe, not a replacement,” he said in an email, answering Enterprise questions.

National Grid is installing 2.5 miles of 8-inch pipe that will connect two distribution pipe systems previously not connected, said Stella, adding, “This will provide better service reliability for those customers.”

National Grid expects construction to be complete by the end of 2022, Stella said.

“All work is being done within National Grid’s right-of-way and all required environmental and NYSDOT permits have been approved,” he said.

Two weeks ago, Stella said, a letter was sent to 74 residents along the route where the tree work, which began March 14, is being done.                   

“We will be installing a new gas main from the River of Life Church, 2333 Western Ave., to the Cumberland Farms on the corner of Western Ave. and Rte. 146,” said the letter, which included a map of the pipeline. “We will also install a new gas main from Cumberland Farms to The Grand Rehabilitation and Nursing facility at 428 Route 146.”

“We’re in that time period between when the ground actually can be worked on without causing damage to the soils and whatnot,” said Barber, before the April 1 deadline after which no trees can be cut. That deadline is set by the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation to protect the northern long-eared bat.

The United States Fish and Wildlife Service announced a proposal on March 22 to reclassify the northern long-eared bat as endangered under the Endangered Species Act.

The bat, currently listed as threatened, faces extinction due to the range-wide impacts of white-nose syndrome, a deadly disease affecting cave-dwelling bats across the continent.

Bats are critical to healthy, functioning ecosystems and contribute at least $3 billion annually to the U.S. agriculture economy through pest control and pollination, according to the service.

The DEC anticipates the northern long-eared bats moving from their winter home at the Watervliet Reservoir in Guilderland to within a five-mile circle of trees for the spring and summer, Barber said. 

“It doesn’t mean they’re there,” he said of the bats, but they could be.

Stella said of National Grid’s pipeline work, “We are scheduled to complete all forestry work before the April 1 DEC deadline.”