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Deer Park Residents Upset As Town Prepares To Cut Down 100-Year-Old Trees

DEER PARK, N.Y. (CBSNewYork) -- Residents of a quiet Long Island street are upset about a repaving project that will remove a dozen large, century-old trees.

"There's a patch that was beat up badly by the winter storms, we asked them to just fix that," Donna Antonacci told CBS2's Alice Gainer, "Instead they're doing the whole street and they're making it more than it needs to be."

As part of the project by the Town of Babylon, Brevoort Place in the hamlet of Deer Park is also being widened, which means the trees will be cut down and residents will lose eight feet of their lawns and driveways, WCBS 880's Sophia Hall reported.

"I came home from vacation to find that they took four, five trees down at the corner. They were monstrous, one of them in particular had to be a hundred years old," Antonacci said.

The Public Works commissioner said there are state guidelines the town must follow to allow for emergency vehicles and snowplows on the street.

"It is not possible to simply repave the roadway as it is too far in disrepair. This road has mot been reconstructed in at least 20-30 years. It has deep structural issues that affect the road base, as well as drainage issues," the Town of Babylon said in a letter to residents.

But the State Department of Transportation said the Town of Babylon is choosing to adhere to state guidelines. They're not required to do so when using their own funding.

The State DOT said Babylon's Department of Public works told them they're not using state funding for the project.

Deer Park Residents Upset As Town Prepares To Cut Down 100-Year-Old Trees

"They're taking away the neighborhood," said Antonacci," ... We don't need a monster street. We just need a clean, paved street."

"We like the block the way it is," another resident said. "There's no traffic. It's very quiet."

There are orange X's spray-painted on the trees set to be removed.

"They tell us that they'll put saplings out," Donna said. "So I said, 'Wait, so you're going to take down a hundred-year-old tree, and you're going to give me a stick?'"

Residents said they hope th town will reconsider and leave the remaining trees be.

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