How Trees Can Impact a Planning Application
Property development tends to be a slow-moving field due to the various legal obstacles that constantly get in your way. But there’s a good reason the system works that way – you can’t get careless with actions that have long-lasting implications, in some cases even permanent ones. Your planning applications will likely get blocked by various obstacles, no matter how careful you may be, requiring extra effort on your part to resolve those situations in a way that suits everyone.
Of all the issues you can encounter in this context, trees are something that doesn’t immediately raise any red flags in most people’s heads. But if you have any experience in this field, they should, because being careless around trees can be one of the costliest mistakes you could make in real estate.
Lawyers Love “Tree Law” – and for Good Reason
Anyone who follows any legal advice communities, like reddit’s “legaladvice” subreddit, has probably come across cases related to the notorious “tree law” at least once or twice. While this is just a meme and doesn’t refer to any specific law, it actually originated in very serious discussions. Those communities feature countless stories of people carelessly removing or damaging a tree in the course of a construction project, only to be told that they are basically facing bankruptcy as a result of their actions. It’s not rare for damages in these cases to be in the six-figure range, and not around the lower end of it.
This is because replacing trees is really expensive. If you damage a tree on someone’s property to the extent where it can’t be saved, you may be required to cover the full cost of replacing the tree with one of the same species and a similar age. If it’s a 20-year-old tree that doesn’t natively grow in your region, you’re essentially paying for the 20 years’ worth of specialized work it would take to grow it – a service most likely provided by a select few experts in your country – plus transplanting costs, which are not negligible on their own.
Be Careful Around Conservation Areas
Conservation areas and preservation orders are the main points to check for any new project. In some cases, a tree preservation order (TPO) may be issued for just one specific tree, but that could be enough to completely block any progress in your desired area. Even when you do have options to work around the tree in question, you still have to put in additional effort to ensure that you don’t impact its health in any way. Given how extensive some trees’ root networks can get, this can be a much more difficult issue to resolve than you might assume.
It May Be Possible to Work Around Issues
If you do encounter a problem on that front, don’t despair. It’s possible that there may be a solution that doesn’t require heavy compromises on your part. However, you have to act fast and get in touch with the right people as early as possible. You’re going to need a professional tree survey company to help you figure out the exact extent of your problem. Ideally, this is something you should secure before even commencing your project. But if you haven’t, it’s not too late.
The most important factor here is to make sure that you choose someone reliable and experienced. Arbtech’s Tree Surveys is a good starting point for pretty much any scenario you could run into. The company has extensive experience in the field and can guide you through a variety of different scenarios, from common and typical ones to very unique cases that require a more in-depth look.
Sites of Special Scientific Interest: Likelihood of Encountering One and Options You Have
Sites of Special Scientific Interest are an issue that you’ll encounter far less frequently compared to other protected sites and trees, but it’s something you shouldn’t underestimate in any case. Some sites are preserved due to the wildlife that occupies them and not necessarily because of any of their trees, but that still doesn’t mean that you’re allowed to do anything with the trees. Quite on the contrary, you might even have to deal with stricter regulations here when it comes to avoiding any disturbance of the local ecosystem.
Will Your Future Plans Be Affected?
You must do your best to ensure that your approach to this situation is not a short-sighted one, because you need to anticipate the various issues that this could cause down the road, not just in the immediate sense. Sure, you may be able to work around the blocking situation now and get your construction project underway. But will you have sufficient options for expansion later? This might seem like a minor implication, but it could actually be pretty severe in the grand scheme of things, especially if your business ends up taking off better than you anticipated.
This is another reason why you will want to work with an expert on this. This is the only way to ensure that you’re seeing the full picture and not missing any important factors. And in situations like these, there’s certainly no shortage of factors that could end up playing a major role. It can cost a bit more to work with the right professional guidance, but that money will be a solid investment into your future plans, and something that will prevent some significant headaches down the road.
If you haven’t started your actual planning yet, you should get in touch with a surveying specialist right now if you have any doubts that the area might be affected. Even if your plans are already in motion, it’s still not too late to have everything checked out by an expert who knows what to look for. As we said above, not all the issues you’ll encounter with this are going to be obvious, and it can pay to have your plans checked out by someone who has seen enough similar scenarios to know what to look for and how to guide you.
