Arborists concerned about threat of falling trees as rain moves in

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — With rain showers moving into Charlotte Wednesday, arborists are concerned about the possibility of massive trees falling in the area.

Channel 9 was at the scene of a decades-old tree that crashed down in Myers Park Monday.

Officials said that in Myers Park and other parts of Charlotte, there are thousands of old trees with shallow roots that are at risk of coming down.

When the rain starts falling Wednesday morning, it will add an enormous amount of weight to the roots of old trees that line neighborhoods like Myers Park.

Charlotte arborists said the number of falling trees has jumped 200 percent in just the past 5 years.

The trees are falling at an alarming rate because many of the city’s trees have already reached their average lifespan, experts said.

The only way to try to keep the city's air clean is to keep planting more trees.

At Barringer Academy, the city planted 260 trees last weekend, but with all the development projects happening across Charlotte, arborists said the space to keep doing that is shrinking.

"Trees are facing much more urban stress these days,” arborist Tim Porter said. “Charlotte isn't the town it was 20 years ago."

Charlotte's tree canopy is at 47 percent, but the city wants to get to 50 percent. Officials said that to try to meet that goal, they're hoping to plant more than 500,000 trees over the next 32 years.

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