FERN protestors opposed to the High Street widening have sprayed giant gums marked for death with pink paint and sad faces.

The Herald counted more than 20 trees including towering tuarts and old peppermints marked by pink crosses from the Royal Fremantle Golf Club to the Stirling Highway intersection.

FERN convenor Billy Amesz says the trees were marked as part of the ongoing campaign against the Main Roads project to widen High Street from Carrington Street to the intersection.

“We want them to scale down the project,” he says. “The current project is completely unnecessary and not supported by the community.”

Main Roads intends to excise 36,000sqm of A-class reserve, including much of the FERN site, as part of the $120 million project. Fremantle council recently withdrew its support for the project, saying it impacts the local community too heavily.

FERN will be relocated to a site on Stevens Street opposite Sullivan Hall and both the public and private golf courses reconfigured to accommodate fewer holes.

Construction is scheduled to start in 2015 and be completed by December 2016.

by CARMELO AMALFI