Photos: Can historic Downtown park recover from storm devastation?
The National Weather Service officially confirmed on Wednesday that an EF1 tornado swept through the south side of Columbus during Tuesday’s storm surge, and the city is still picking up the pieces.
Across the destruction of houses and businesses, Columbus Parks have also suffered a major loss—their history.
Park trees that have been planted for decades were uprooted and pathways destroyed, leaving the Columbus Parks and Recreation team with an extensive recovery plan.
Topiary Park at 480 E. Town St. is among the parks assessed as damaged. Known for its depiction of figures from Georges Seurat’s 1884 painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte, it is now battered by tree damage; fortunately, only one topiary area not part of the painting was harmed in the storm.
Parks and Rec Senior Manager of Strategic Communications, Kerry Francis, spoke on the recovery process for replacing trees and cleaning up damage.
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“We had more than 350 tree reports so far for this storm, and the team is out across the city working on those. To speed up efforts, our Parks team and staff from other areas have been out assisting with tasks that we’re able to complete without the specialized equipment or knowledge our Forestry team has,” Francis said.
With the Forestry team, Parks and Rec will determine where to replant the best space and species to replace the older trees lost in the storm.
Clean up will be a continuous process for weeks to come. Francis is working with volunteer groups for more opportunities to get out and work.
“We just ask people to be patient with us with routine maintenance and tree requests, just because this is just a massive clean up for us, just like everyone else,” said Francis.
Columbus Park and Recreation encourages residents to report concerns to 311 and to exercise caution when encountering any storm damage.
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