A Tree Replacement Notice has been served on Parkstairs Ltd over the removal of trees from land in Broadstairs.
Thanet council carried out an investigation following complaints that landowner Parkstairs had felled more than 40 trees and closed off a public footpath at woodland off Park Avenue in February.
Parkstairs Ltd said a survey had “identified a number of dead and dying trees which are in a dangerous condition, some of this is due to heavy ivy growth strangling the trees.
“There is also historic storm damage which has been worsened by the recent extreme weather. In addition, there are numerous potential trips and falls across the land and a real danger to the public of falls from height due to damaged branches”.
Members of the Park Avenue Woodland Group delivered a petition to Thanet council in July requesting the trees be replanted.
Thanet council has now concluded an investigation and ordered Parkstairs to replant 12 trees at the site.
Twelve trees of those removed were considered to be protected by Area Tree Preservation Orders from 1956 and 1985 which cover the site. This means 12 trees of specific species are to be replanted on the site by March 31, 2021. Only the trees present on the site when the orders were made (and any replacements subsequently planted) can be required to be replanted by the council. Those trees that are self seeded are not covered by the Area Tree Protection Order.
The council has also issued a written warning following the work to a Mountain Ash tree at at Thanet Indoor Bowls Club in October.
Following notification from the public, planned removal works were halted and the tree was assessed by the council’s Horticultural and Biodiversity officer. The tree is expected to regrow and will be monitored over the coming months.
The work prompted protest from members of Thanet Trees group and residents in the area. Some 60 protesters held up banners and signs outside Thanet Indoor Bowls Centre on Eastern Esplanade demanding enforcement was carried out for the cutting back of the mature tree at the site.
In November Thanet District Council applied to the DEFRA green recovery fund in collaboration with Trees for Cities for £46k to run three community tree planting days in Ramsgate with around 30 mature trees for each event and to employ a dedicated part time open spaces officer for the duration of the 16 month project. The outcome is expected shortly.
The Climate Change Officer is also working with Earthwatch with the aim of creating a “Tiny forest” in Thanet; a woodland the size of a football pitch as seen on Countryfile last weekend. Further details will be shared once funding has been received to ensure this is a community led initiative.
As part of the council’s future biodiversity strategy, a bee plan is being prepared by the Open Spaces team with the assistance of the Bumblebee Trust. A proportion of open spaces land will be managed for pollinators, including creating semi natural habitats with a high percentage of pollinator friendly native herbs and flowers such as clover, yarrow and birds foot trefoil. Full details of this will be prepared for the spring.
The council is also looking to work with partners across Kent, including other councils and Kent Wildlife Trust, for ways to most effectively protect and support biodiversity in the coming months.
Cue the moans from the ‘it’s not enough’ brigade.
It isn’t enough.
I’m sure with your username you’d flatten all Greenland and put in useless unused airports.
Bravo.
It is about time TDC took action against this sort of thing perhaps they have realised at last there is a climate emergency going on. Well done to the people of Broadstairs for fighting this destruction ,we could do with a few more mini forests in the area.
What has planting trees to do with the climate emergency,
Trees have everything to do with fighting climate change. You can find that out for yourself with a quick google search.
Not everything, surely?
CO2 is a major ‘greenhouse’ gas, leads directly to more warming of the earth. Trees absorb CO2 so help reduce this effect.
I should think a drastic reduction in the use of fossil fuels would reduce it a lot more. Have the members of Thanet Trees drastically reduced their car use?
Trees do absorb CO2, indeed.
However, they only live for a few score of years before they die and decay, releasing their stored CO2 back into the atmosphere.
We (ie humans) push 5.1 billion tonnes of C02 into the atmosphere every year.
A fully grown tree absorbs 21kg every year (and when it dies, it releases it all again)
Although trees are very important for all sorts of reasons, coping with CO2 emissions is not one if them.
If you really care about the environment, get rid of your car and stop flying.
Wake up and smell the coffee, no trees no plants no use
Where have you been? Don’t you know anything about the Brazilian rainforest being the lungs of the world all trees help with climate change look it up on the web you’ll learn something
I’m with you on this ,well done all we have to stand up to this ,we need to somehow find out before this type of thing happens so we can stop it
Great to see TDC serving this notice on Parkstairs after a long investigation following a long campaign by local residents and the wider community. I’d like to see legal action taken against them but this is a step in the right direction. A recent Council meeting unanimously supported my motion calling on the Council to designate the area as an Open Space in the Local Plan and we’ll need to keep the pressure on o make sure this happens..
Are they also reopening the footpath?
This is the kind of news we want to see TDC. We have one of the lowest levels of tree coverage in the country, we must change that and treat our trees as assets not liabilities.
There has been low tree coverage in Thanet for centuries so please stop blaming TDC for everything.
That rowan tree nest to the bowls club should have had a careful thinning-out years ago by the looks of it.
next to!
Trees ,when fully mature, absorb a lot of carbon from the atmosphere. Which is one of the reasons that there is so much dismay at the burning of the Amazon and Indonesian rain forests. When excessive levels of CO2 in the atmosphere worsens climate chaos.
Britain has a remnant of its own rainforest in the small woods and larger areas of natural tree cover to be found all over the country. Though very little in Thanet.
Battling over one or two trees beside buildings or trapped between road junctions may not sound much but these battles are taking place all over the nation.
Successive governments have expressed support for preserving, and extending , our tree cover but these views sometimes do not seem to penetrate down to the level of local Council officials and building companies.
Too often, building companies seem to ride roughshod over the need to protect our trees and local council officials seem to think that property developers are on the side of the angels and should not be challenged.
Which is why local residents end up having to battle over every tree.
The debate about tree preservation ended years ago and all main political Parties are committed to protect trees, and the laws they have passed confirm this. But we need to be alert to attempts to bypass the law.
I refer you to my comprehensive reply above.
Although trees do absorb CO2, they also release it when they die.
The fossil fuels we are burning with wild abandon were formed under the earth over a period of millions of years, about 300 million years ago. We are releasing all this CO2 in the matter of a couple of centuries. You’d have to plant 10s of billions of trees to counter the CO2 emissions.
Be part of the solution, not the problem. Don’t drive to Thanet Trees demos. Walk, cycle or use public transport instead.
Oh yes! And plant some trees. An acre of trees soaks up the CO2 spewed out by the average motorist in a year. So get planting
TDC DO NOT have a tree inspector and now for laziness class all trees as protected years ago they had every protected tree numbered so easily identified.
All these mostly self seeded tree’s usually seed in any old place encroaching near properties causing structural problems these should NOT be classed as a protected.
No one mentions the huge amount of felled tree’s at the end of sowell street because I expect TDC took a back hander someone picks and chooses which tree’s to allow I wonder how many of these tree huggers have had problems with them damaging their properties or cutting light from their properties.
Check out the tree cut down in tippledore way butchered
Bunch of tree hugging busy bodies with nothing better to do with their lives. Trees eventually die or get damaged and cause problems so why not cut them down and replace them. Plenty of trees have been cut down around thanet to make way for construction projects yet they never get protested about.
Well said
Thanet trees complain all the time and good for them for doing so.
Lots of new trees at Hartsdown
Yeah I see an they have the cheek to ask u to water them in the summer when were on a hose pipe ban. why plant in 1st place if they can’t water themselfs
yes after some of the older ones were cut down to make way for them
No tŕees cut down there
TDC does have a tree officer. Looking at the picture there does seem to be a lot of spindly trees, so judicious management is or was required.Wholesale destruction is not on, even if the claim of unhealthy trees is sustainable.The cure for ivy growth is to cut the ivy tendrils at the base.In the New Scientist it is posited that ivy growth is increasing due to global warming, so Parkstairs Ltd would do well to promote tree growth in order to absorb carbon and reduce global warming.
The felling of TPO trees is a criminal offence and can be subject to a £20,000 fine per tree.If a few of these £20k fines were handed out,developers and arborists would be much less cavalier in their unlawful activities.Because they think there is no police force they carry on regardless.
Loving trees is not a crime nor is ‘sylvan snowflakery’,but unthinking tree felling and surgery, is anti social behaviour as great in its impact as vandalism and graffiti is in streetscapes.
Please stop saying that planting trees will reduce global warming. We would have to plant billions of trees to counter the effects of burning fossil fuels, and then keep replacing then every few score years.
As people are not going to stop driving anytime soon then plant millions of trees. Better looking than humans as well. Trees can last over a thousand years if not cut down by twats.
Billions upon billions of trees, if people are not prepared to give up burning fossil fuels.
And most trees don’t last thousands of years, twats or not.
maybe not but some do people never read anything about anything?
There are often good reasons to cut one down.
What was on that site in Duke Street in the past?
Just been looking on this link at sea towns
https://urbantreecover.org/location/ramsgate/
Comparing thanet seaside towns with other seaside towns are towns seem to be around average for seaside towns ! Ramsgate does well at 14% margate not so good at about 10%. Perhaps it’s just normal for seas side towns to have low tree coverage due to the salt air strong winds and mostly poor soil. There could be more trees planted but I think to many tree huggers are comparing a seaside town to a countryside town which of course have different local climates.m
In fact if you compare margate to the other north sea facing seaside townsit comes very the top !
So all on all compare like for like from that survey thanet isnt that bad for a seaside area.
* seaside towns it comes very close to the top *
Thanet news has certainly opened my eyes to how people think in Thanet I really pity future generations who will have a treeless, wild life free concrete jungle to live in. Treehuggers will have tried to do their bit what will those who object to trees and wild life have done? diddly squat that’s what
The number of people who post comments on IOT News is very small compared to the Thanet’s entire population and should probably not be taken as a representative sample.
to Thanet’s
To Thanets what Marva?
“To Thanet” is a correction.
The correct correction is “to Thanet’s”!