BFSNA coordinates with woodworker to give Franklin Square elms new life

There’s no replacement for the majesty of a 175-year-old Elm tree canopy, but if there is a second life for such beauty – lost to Dutch Elm Disease – and Carpenter Austin Vyas thinks it can be accomplished in his woodshop. Vyas was one of the reclaimed woodworkers that took away the first crop of diseased American Elm trees cut down – sadly – in Franklin Square last March out of necessity. Since that time, in his garage woodworking shop in Milton, he’s milled one of those trees (the one cut down closest to the perimeter fence) into slabs and made several unique items out of the rare, hard-to-find wood.