Procedure and House Affairs committee  It really depends on the subsoil conditions, I think, but one of the tests or one of the procedures that can be done, for example, is to actually map it out. There's equipment now that you can use that would map out the actual root extent of the tree.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think that's an engineering question. It's possible to tunnel under the whole city of Ottawa to put in an LRT, so maybe you can tunnel under here to do a visitor centre, but....

Procedure and House Affairs committee  That is one of our requests: Can we just wait until it leafs out and see whether it has, in fact, survived the winter, and if it has, in what condition?

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I would think so, although, again, I don't have that expertise myself. However, I think that probably at this point the sap has already started to rise in that tree, and I would think that whatever opportunity there was to cut it down for that purpose is probably lost at this poi

Procedure and House Affairs committee  The critical root zone of the elm right now is partly a parking lot. There's pavement and cars parked there. The rest of it, up until very recently, was very publicly accessible. There's a lot of foot traffic and a lot of vehicular traffic right around it, so that will cause comp

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Absolutely. That's what it's required for, yes.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  No.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  Yes, because then what you want to do is give it every chance to survive and every chance to thrive, so you would want to take this opportunity in a way. Now that everything has been cleared out, you can actually do the soil remediation because half the work is done.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  As I said, there is no public information about phase two of the visitor centre, so I'm in the dark.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I've looked at a number of examples of historic elms like this and it's surprising how many you can actually find. Just around the table here there are examples that I could refer to. I have not seen the Washington tree itself, although I think it's in the book on the trees of D.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I think that's a very good comment. Many of these historic trees are in fact braced, trussed and filled in ways that preserve them and keep them alive. They're extraordinary measures, if you will, but people care about and want to have these trees—are awed by these trees—enough t

Procedure and House Affairs committee  It's been kind of kept alive that way. There's other examples like that. The "Comfort" maple near St. Catharines is a huge maple thought to be over 300 years old.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  You're welcome.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I would agree with you. It's for the people locally, but it's also a strong symbol. It's a strong message.

Procedure and House Affairs committee  I certainly agree with you. That northeast quadrant, up until last week, was a green space on Parliament Hill. You're up here all the time and you know that in the summertime it's a pretty impressive place if you're standing in the sun out there. It's nice to be able to get a lit