Display Of Artificial Sequoias Opens At Airport

A display of full-scale artificial sequoia trees and wayside exhibits was dedicated in a special evening ceremony on May 14th at the Fresno, California, airport by superintendent Craig Axtell and city officials.

Mayor Ashley Swearengin and Russell Widmar, director of aviation, Fresno Yosemite International Airport, praised the displays as attention-getting and important tools for focusing attention on a jewel in a region of iconic wild places.

Dave Uberuaga, acting superintendent of Yosemite National Park, also welcomed the display, saying that it underscored the area’s natural riches and that he hoped it would encourage residents to explore them with renewed interest. 

The display consists of four clusters of 25-foot-tall, life-like sequoias designed and executed under the direction of Gary Hanick, president and co-founder of NatureMaker, creator of museum-quality sculpted trees. The display is accompanied by wayside exhibits in English and Spanish that tell the story of the national parks and the giants of Sequoia National Park. When completed, the forest will extend beyond the current space in the airport’s passenger terminal.

The original concept for a forest was Widmar’s, as part of a plan for renovating the terminal. The concept’s development, leading to a forest of sequoias, proceeded with the involvement of Alexandra Picavet, the park’s public affairs specialist, along with other park employees.

The success of the project was evident even before the ceremony had concluded, as airline passengers and others began stopping to touch the trees to see if they were real and to capture them in pictures with their children or themselves. Superintendent Axtell said he believed the display would easily accomplish its goal of spreading the National Park Service message.

“This impressive work,” he said, “will not only tell visitors from other parts of the world and the country about our special places—perhaps for the first time—it will also capture the attention of those  in our community who have not yet experienced them, and, I very much hope, bring them to us.”