Overview
Tree strategy
Trees make a big contribution to the quality of our lives. In addition to visual amenity, they help to improve air quality and reduce air pollution, store carbon and mitigate against high temperatures, and retain water and reduce flooding. Trees are important for wildlife, hosting and providing food for a wide range of flora and fauna. Trees also deliver community benefits by defining recreational spaces, shaping cultural identity through landscape improvements, and by providing food in orchards and farms. Scientific research shows that trees provide huge benefits to people’s physical and mental health, providing calming and peaceful environments and promoting general wellbeing. Our trees are, therefore, an essential resource providing multiple benefits to the people of Staffordshire.
How do we manage our trees?
Staffordshire County Council recognises the importance of our tree resource and identifies standards for its management. This will ensure the long-term conservation of trees for the people of Staffordshire and future generations.
Our approach provides a framework to establish a healthy, balanced, and sustainable tree population capable of withstanding predicted climatic changes and the impact of diseases. It also enables us to ensure we reduce the risk to the public from potentially hazardous trees.
Our approach sets out a framework to manage our trees and to achieve the following objectives:
- Conserve and enhance the tree resource in terms of quality, diversity and numbers.
- Promote public safety through appropriately resourced tree inspection and maintenance programmes.
- Fulfil the Council’s legal obligations as a tree owner by addressing safety and major nuisance issues effectively.
- Inform customers of our legal obligations relating to trees and manage enquiries and expectations appropriately.
- Establish sustainable management programmes for Council woodland.
- Promote and increase the current level of tree planting on public and private land to address the decline of individual trees and woodland cover, mitigate the potential effects of ash dieback and other potentially harmful diseases, and to protect and enhance nature.
Tree risk management
The actual likelihood of tree failure resulting in damage to people and/ or property is very low. In fact, as the Health and Safety Executive states “The risk, per tree, of causing fatality is of the order of one in 150 million for all trees in Britain or one in 10 million for those trees in, or adjacent to, areas of public use.” Despite this, there is some risk to public safety. As a result, landowners are legally required to take a common-sense approach to tree risk management in order to reduce the risk as much as possible, proportionate to the resources available.
Appropriate and effective tree inspection procedures should ensure that changes in tree condition are noted and, if necessary, acted upon before the tree becomes hazardous to persons and/ or property. The Council’s tree inspection regime considers a range of criteria including species, age, size, health and condition, location, site usage, hazard risk, and landscape and ecological value. We aim to balance the management of trees for public safety with their ecological and landscape value. Both management objectives are important, but the nature and use of each site normally dictates which one should take precedence.
How do we manage the risk from trees?
Service areas now have robust tree risk management regimes in place, which will ensure that high usage areas such as highways, footpaths and built-up districts are ‘zoned’ and prioritised for inspections at least every five years. In addition, trees outside of priority areas are also inspected in accordance with property maintenance inspection regimes.
Tree surveyors have industry standard Lantra training in Visual Tree Analysis methodology. Where defects are found on trees, inspectors will assess the likelihood of failure and prevalence of target to determine which category of response time should be applied to remedial works.
When Staffordshire is impacted by adverse weather such as storms and gales, which can impact tree stability, we will undertake responsive inspections and continue to prioritise management on a risk basis.
Replacing trees removed for tree risk management purposes
We will seek to maintain and increase our tree population by implementing appropriate tree planting schemes on suitable sites. Approaches to restocking will include landscaping on new development schemes, woodland and orchard creation, and highway planting. We will also continue to support and encourage other authorities and developers to implement well planned tree planting and maintenance schemes.
Nuisance issues relating to trees
Common complaints about trees include blocked light, interference with TV signals, and leaf litter. An individual’s tolerance of these complaints is a subjective and personal matter and there are a variety of other potential nuisances associated with trees, most of which are minor or seasonal. We will not automatically fell, or prune Council owned trees solely for the reason that they are causing inconvenience.
It is your common law right to cut back any branches that are overhanging and interfering with your property, as long as your actions don’t affect the health of the tree as a whole. You should check with your local district/borough council before carrying out any work, in case the tree is covered by a tree preservation order or is in a conservation area.
Tree roots damaging property
If you suspect that the roots of a Council owned tree are causing damage to your property, such as the foundations or private drainage, you are at liberty to submit a formal insurance claim to the Council’s insurance section using this form Make a claim - Staffordshire County Council. Your completed claim will be checked by our in-house claims team and once all details are received, our reports will be forwarded to our appointed insurance claims handler who will write to you directly upon receipt of the claim. You should expect to receive a decision from our appointed insurance claim handler regarding any liability within three months of the insurer’s acknowledgement letter.
