Wilmington, North Carolina, woke up to heartbreak. Overnight, a stand of century-old live oak trees vanished. WWAY News shared the shock many felt seeing bare dirt where giants once stood tall on Wrightsville Avenue.

"These were absolutely outstanding legacy trees. Just beautiful," resident Nina Brown said, per WWAY News. Now, there's only emptiness.

Johnson Development Associates cut the trees to make way for a new build. The South Carolina-based company used an old Wilmington city code to bypass newer, stricter protections. Mayor Bill Saffo explained that removing those trees would have been far harder under today's code, WWAY News reported.

"They may have, very well, the legal right to do what they did, that doesn't mean it was right," he said. He also shared that the city could have moved the trees for free if the developer had called first.

WWAY reported that "a stop-work order was issued" right after the removal so officials could check for code violations. The developer has promised to plant 276 new trees, including southern live oaks and magnolias.

Brown said that would "make the residents care a lot more about the new development, and see that the developers want to keep the trees," but it will take decades for saplings to become mighty oaks, so this is hardly an equal replacement.

FROM OUR PARTNER

Save $10,000 on solar panels without even sharing your phone number

Want to go solar but not sure who to trust? EnergySage has your back with free and transparent quotes from fully vetted providers that can help you save as much as $10k on installation.

To get started, just answer a few questions about your home — no phone number required. Within a day or two, EnergySage will email you the best local options for your needs, and their expert advisers can help you compare quotes and pick a winner.

Watch now: Is this common bathroom item making you sick?

Trees aren't just pretty. They cool scorching streets, filter dirty air, reduce flooding, and soften the noise of traffic and city life, benefits that are now lost to the residents until the new saplings mature.

Elsewhere, neighbors have been caught poisoning each other's trees out of spite. In one case, a homeowner saw four of their old-growth trees damaged. Homeowners associations sometimes force residents to cut down healthy trees for rule violations.

Disputes over tree cutting have sparked feuds that last for years. Such stories show why stronger protections matter — so developers, HOAs, or neighbors can't treat towering trees like disposable weeds.

Redditors were equally outraged.