Cumbrian Trees and Woodland
Best known as the home of the Lake District – one of the ten national parks in the United Kingdom – Cumbria offers a multitude of countryside locations. It is predominantly rural, featuring a wide range of some of the country’s largest lakes and tallest mountains.
An estimated 54% of the population live in rural areas, significantly surpassing the national average of 18% across England and Wales. Situated in the North West region, the largest urban areas in the county of Cumbria are Carlisle, Barrow-in-Furness, Kendal, Whitehaven and Workington.
Statistics from 2010 claimed that Cumbria had 96.6 kilohectares of woodland, translating to 18% of tree cover over the entire land area of the county. However, over the course of the following two decades, 136 hectares of woodland was lost, leading the local authorities to enforcing policies that would protect local trees and initiating schemes that would offset declining tree numbers by planting new trees.
Anyone intending on staging a planning project in Cumbria may be deterred by concerns that the local council will be strict with protecting plots of land where trees are present. Bypassing any potential problems caused by trees is possible, however, by reaching out to an arboriculturist for a tree survey and any other required tree services on the development site.
Tree Retention and Preservation
Policies that act to conserve, preserve and protect trees in Cumbria apply to each county, including Allerdale, Barrow, Carlisle, Copeland, Eden and South Lakeland. Two policies that are used to protect trees in all areas of the county and other sections of the UK are known as conservation areas and Tree Preservation Orders (TPOs).
In many ways similar to one another, conservation areas and Tree Preservation orders (TPOs) are both tree management protections that are controlled by the local council, and before any works that could disturb the trees are conducted, prior consent from the corresponding local authority is needed without exception. The difference between the two forms of protection is that a conservation area applies to all trees within a specific zone and a Tree Preservation Order (TPO) will be given to an individual tree.
Local Authorities Overseeing Cumbria
- Allerdale Borough Council
- Barrow Borough Council
- Carlisle City Council
- Copeland Borough Council
- Cumbria County Council
- Eden District Council
- South Lakeland District Council
Arboricultural Surveys
Any potential issues relating to trees can be eliminated by trusting in the insights and expertise of an arboricultural surveyor. The usual first step in the tree surveying process would be to arrange a BS5837 tree survey. During a visit to the site, an arboricultural consultant will start a BS5837 assessment by inspecting all trees present and dictating the next steps for each tree based on their condition and value. A predetermined mitigation hierarchy will then decide the fate of each tree, with action needed if any trees are likely to affect or be affected by the plans of the development.
Retaining trees that are safe from the development plans or valuable enough to be worth tweaking the plans of the development will be a priority outcome. If the plans cannot be adapted to avoid valuable trees or if the trees are in poor condition or could cause harm to individuals on the site, however, the arboriculturist will advise moving the trees elsewhere inside or outside of the site, or destroy them and compensate with the planting of new trees.
Immediately after completing the assessment, the arboricultural consultant will move their attention to producing a tree report. Including information about the tree survey, next steps developed by the surveyor and recommendations of further surveys needed on the site, tree reports will feature everything needed for the planning officer of the local planning authority to grant planning permission on the site.
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Limitations regarding protections over trees will prevent you from developing on land with trees present prior to a tree survey. With an arboricultural surveyor’s insights from a tree report, the local authority will have no reason but to grant the planning application on the site. Developers would be advised to book a tree survey as early as possible, as it will enable them to secure a desirable date and remove any obstructions to the development at the planning stage.
Inform our helpful arboricultural consultancy team of the details of your site and project by getting in touch using our quick quote form online or by calling the number at the top of this page by phone. Using your specifications, our team will create a free quote, and providing you are happy to move forwards, our qualified and capable arboriculturists will visit your site to conduct a tree survey and help you to gain a planning condition.