Landmark mature trees felled in Wembley Park

Last week when I passed a tree maintenance vehicle parked on Kings Drive, Wembley Park, I though they were there to reduce the size of the rather magnificent pair of trees in the corner of the Lycée (formerly Brent Town Hall/Wembley Town Hall) grounds. A day later I was shocked to see they were completely gone.

 

 

The trees had been there for decades and were a local landmark, lately contrasting with the Quintain tower blocks on the horizon.

We are lucky to have a good number of mature trees in this part of Wembley Park with trees preserved in the grounds of  King's Court and Carmel Court (on the right in above picture) and on the Kings Drive-Pilgrims Way council estate further up the hill.

Lately, we have lost the wonderful willow on Greenhill Way. This followed another willow lost on The Paddocks side of the Lycée  grounds some time ago, perhaps through storm damage.

 

Greenhill Way willow

Lycée  willow

The 'after' photographs of these sites present a forlorn picture:

King's Drive

Greenhill Way

The  Lycée King's Drive willow before removal
 

 Lycée King's Drive after removal of the willow and laying of artificial turf

 

I asked the Lycée for a statement about the felling this morning, particularly given their participation in eco-schools and commitment to bio-diversity.

 

Notice on the Forty Lane gardens, near the bus stop

They kindly responded promptly:

We're unfortunately not at liberty to expose all the details  but those trees weren't felled for the sole intention of felling them. They have been proven by many experts over the course of years to damage property and we had no choice but to prevent any further issues and were asked to remove them. 

Our eco-school programme remains. We have, in this mind, retained all we could of those trees. Trunks will foster our forest-school area by providing seating for the children and all the chippings have been kept on the grounds to provide compost to all our beds and growing trees.

 

 

The importance of tree cover was emphasised by the Tree Council in their ubrna tree canopy survey:

Urban trees are being increasingly recognised for the many benefits they provide, such as removing carbon dioxide and pollutants from the air, providing habitats for wildlife, and making our urban areas more attractive, enjoyable and healthy places to live and spend time in. To help manage and understand this important resource, Trees for Cities, Brillianto, Woodland Trust and Forest Research have hosted a citizen science project to map the canopy cover of towns and cities across the England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.

Contributors have helped to build this canopy cover map for the UK by measuring the canopy cover across the UK.

This map section with the Lycée  at the foot of the image and King's Drive at the top gave a tree canopy estimate of 17.9%, better than the average, but lost trees will need to be replaced by a number of smaller trees given the canopy size of mature trees and the time need for replacements to reach maturity.

Canopy of the Greenhill Way willow (Google Earth)

Canopies of the King's Drive trees
 

Responding to a request for a statement on the issue Brent Council's Principal Tree Officer said:

I can advise that the original planning application 13/1995 did have a condition relating to tree protection, and a subsequent application 14/0315 was discharged relating to tree protection, however this was only relevant for the period of the development of the site and for a period of five years following the development of the site.

 

Any longer term tree protection would only be afforded to the trees if they were protected by a Tree Preservation Order and I can advise that no Tree Preservation Order appears to have been made.

 

 Another mature tree in the Lycée International de Londres grounds, can it be protected?