A new era is ready to take root at Toomer's Corner just in time for football season.
Phase one of the renovation project was completed on schedule, paving the way for planting the trees as part of phase two later in the year.
"The gates went down Sunday night before class started on Monday [Aug. 18]," said Ben Bermester, campus planner for Auburn's Facilities Management Office. "The next steps for the project will be the tree replacement. We plan to replace the two Oaks, probably in February of next year when in the dormant time for trees. It's the best time of year for transplanting them."
Bermester, design project lead for phase one of the project, said the most demanding aspect of the operation was removing 1,700 tons of contaminated soil from the northeastern corner of Samford Park.
Soil removal continued until the State Pesticide Reside Lab considered the soil acceptable for planting, going as deep as 6 feet in some places.
Tebuthiuron Spike 80DF, the herbicide used to poison the tree beds, also infected some trees along the edge of Samford Park where the circular seat wall now sits, which had to be removed.
While the soil has been deposited safely off-site, the corner is beginning to look like its former self, ensuring the successful growth of the future trees will take time and patience, especially during football season.
Horticulture professor Gary Keever, who also serves on the president-appointed Tree Preservation Committee, cautioned that anything from car accidents to unruly fans could disrupt the growing process.
"The rolling probably wouldn't harm it, but since 2010, the trees have been lit on fire at least twice, after Georgia in 2010 and in 2013 after the Alabama-A&M game," Keever said. "We have to have security and have education and make our fans aware that these trees are a valuable resource and we need to protect them. That doesn't mean that we can't roll them eventually, we just have to recognize that they won't be ready as soon as we put them in the ground."
The previous Toomer's trees were live oaks, a non-native species common throughout the Southeast, but respond to certain latitudes and climates, Keever said.
An adviser for the tree selection process, Keever said the committee narrowed its options to nursery-grown live oaks in central Georgia, South Carolina and near Birmingham, where the climate is most similar to Auburn's.
Despite much speculation, the offspring of the original Toomer's Oaks were eliminated from consideration early on.
"The Toomer's seedlings that we looked at had not been grown well," Keever said. "The ones that we were able to locate were not nursery grown. Nursery grown trees are pruned at a certain age so that they have a long, straight trunk, you get the branching that you want and the canopy will continue to grow. The quality just didn't warrant being placed back up there."
Dan King, associate Vice President of facilities management and one of the restoration project leaders, said there was no update on the tree selection process yet, but that phase one was "a good first step" to restoring the corner.
"I think the finished product looks great, I think the quality of the workmanship is excellent, [overall] I think it was a success," King said. "We're working on phase two and we'll share that with campus when it get finalized, but I think phase one went well and I think Auburn Nation will be pleased with phase two as well."
King said the selection should take place during the 2014 fall semester, with the planting taking place in the spring.
The trees are expected to be planted on the corner by the start of the 2015 football season.
In the meantime, the legacy of the Toomer's Oaks is producing unexpected benefits around campus.
"One of the great things that's come out of this is the greater awareness of the importance of trees on this campus," Keever said. "The University is currently having a landscape master plan prepared and it calls for greater tree protection measures. I don't know whether we could have gotten that beforehand. I think it's because of the importance of these trees."
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