Norwalk resident Anna Arroyo’s favorite park, the Milan Wildlife Area, is filled with beautiful, large trees, many of them quite old.

So Arroyo, 25, took it hard when she and her friend visited the park Tuesday and discovered that many of the trees she loves are being cut down along Lovers Lane.

Many of the trees are dead ash trees, and Oxford Township decided it was time to clear away trees that threatened to topple onto the road. The Ohio Department of Natural Resources, which owns Milan Wildlife Area, says it accepts that the tree clearing had to be done.

Arroyo, a substitute teacher, loves the Milan Wildlife Area so much that last spring she and her husband cleaned it up, hauling away about a dozen bags of trash.

On Tuesday, she and a friend went to visit the 296-acre wildlife area, 3.5 miles west of the village of Milan via Ohio 113, but found Lovers Lane blocked off.

The park is kept in a natural state — trees that fall across pedestrian paths are apparently left there, Arroyo said — so she was startled to see the trees being removed. Many were 10 to 15 feet from the road.

“As we drove away I could not help but think of how so many cities in our area are marked by the beautiful old trees that are on our tree lawns,” she wrote in an e-mail to the Register. “If we were to use the same logic as whoever made the decision to cut these trees down, our cities would become bare concrete slabs because at some point a tree may fall and block the road or knock down a building.”

Michael Parker, an Oxford Township trustee, says most of the trees being removed are dead ash trees attacked by the emerald ash borer, an insect that’s been wiping out ash trees across the state. Like other local governments and park systems, Oxford Township decided it was time to remove the trees for safety reasons.

“They could come down in the middle of the night at any time, and you’ve got an obstruction in the road, or worse, you’ve hit a vehicle,” Parker said.

ODNR spokesman John Windau said Oxford Township can clear away trees from the road’s right of way without asking permission. But the township also obtained permission to remove trees that are not in the right of way but still overhang the road, he said.

The letter of permission allows them to remove trees as far as 20 feet from the road if they seem to be a hazard, said Scott Butterworth, wildlife management supervisor for District 2 of the ODNR.

The township is allowed to remove any tree leaning out over the road or toward the road, he said.

“A lot of the trees there are ash trees,” Butterworth said. “They are dead and they are a traffic hazard.”