Delta council has approved a new tree removal policy for city-owned trees that residents or businesses want removed.
A staff report notes that the city’s urban forestry division in the engineering department receives approximately 1,500 service requests from residents and businesses every year regarding trees from city property, expressing a wide range of concerns from safety of large branches, conflicts with a home’s driveway and sap dripping onto vehicles.
The policy establishes circumstances that warrant consideration of city tree removal and circumstances that do not.
“For example, the city would consider removing a city tree if it is assessed as high risk or unsafe and cannot be mitigated through arboriculture practices; if it is dead, diseased beyond expectation of recovery, or structurally unsound; or if it is damaging a driveway and roots cannot be removed without impacting tree stability. The city would generally not consider removing a healthy city tree if it is shedding sap on vehicles, blocking scenic views, or deemed aesthetically unpleasing,” the report explains.
The report adds the policy seeks to strike a “common sense” balance in responding to legitimate concerns about city trees while at the same time recognizing Delta’s long-term priority to protect and grow the urban tree canopy.
An update report last year on Delta’s Urban Forest Strategy noted that a geospatial inventory of city-owned trees in the urban forest is a priority action item.
Key benefits of an inventory include improved asset management, guidance for future tree planting and public outreach.
The inventory project would involve a field-based survey of city trees in urban areas, focusing on street and park specimen trees.
Data would be collected about each tree and the tree’s location would be recorded on a map.
Staff could then query the database to better understand the urban forest as a system, find future tree planting locations and determine which species are doing well or poorly in a changing climate, the report notes.
