I am fed up with neighbours hassling me about our tree

[Silosy]

We live in a terrace and there are a row of mature - as in 100+ year old trees - along all of our back gardens. They’re a mixture of sycamore and plane, all healthy all well kept.

The people living directly behind us and adjacent have moaned incessantly about our tree for the last 15 years.

‘It’s pushing our paving up.’
’It shades our patio between 4 and 5 in the summer.’
’Pigeons roost in it and shit on our garden.’
’Leaves fall in our garden.’
’It makes the ground level uneven.’

All of these are frankly nonsense arguments and I’ve pointed out on numerous occasions that the tree has been there longer than all of our houses, we ensure it’s maintained and if it was felled, the heave would cause more issues for them then its presence but no. I’ve had another whingeing message today telling me we ‘have to do something’ about the tree because the paving stones at the end of their garden which they laid over the roots of the tree are being pushed up.

What do you want me to do, exactly? Go back in time and advise you not to lay paving stones where tree roots are?

Before anyone posts it, the tree is not TPO’d and no, we can’t just get a TPO on it.

And no, I’m not going to fell it. I’m just ranting really.

Plane trees are enormous. They would look ludicrous if cut down too small. The neighbours couldn't possibly have missed that they had a 100-year-old plane tree just over the fence of the house they were thinking of buying. It was down to them to think carefully about whether they could live with that.

Some people posting on this thread would hate it where we live. The gardens are small and narrow so all of us have trees and other plants poking through fences and over walls. The houses were built in Victorian times on what had been an orchard and there are huge pear trees dotted around in many of the neighbouring gardens. Over the years most people have planted other trees and large shrubs too. It's a conservation area so the trees are all protected. Good. We have lots of wildlife here. Long may that continue.

Legally they can cut any branches or roots on their side. If they do so it could kill the tree.
Also legally you are generally responsible for any damage your tree causes to their property, so if they built a structure over the roots and then subsequently the roots grew and impacted their structure, they may have a valid claim against you. These things aren’t black and white, and often end up in court. But you might want to consider how it might end up. Having aired their grievances numerous times to you and your failure to act may work against you if it when to court.

I have come across a number of people like these neighbours over the years. My last home had a communal garden with two sides marked by Victorian lime trees, beautiful. But developers put in a row of houses behind only a short way from the trees, and people moved in who wanted them gone. They shaded the gardens in the afternoon, they might fall on their greenhouse, etc. I called them, to myself, dendrophobes. In 87, they benefitted from them. That part of row which extended beyond the trees lost the gable ends of the houses, falling outwards because of the low air pressure. The houses of the complainers were not affected by the storm. Didn't stop them scrambling over with a chain saw and cutting some leaning bits.

The other sided was alongside a playground, but this was sold to developers who put up a block of town houses. I wrote to the council during the planning process to point out the existence of the trees with some information about the importance of the distal roots and got the bnuilding moved from the boundary. I was off work one day and saw how they dealt with them. A digger went along a few feet from the boundary, severing the roots, and then lifted its tool and broke off the branches.

Some time later I received an officious letter (I was secretary of our flats) demanding that as one of our trees was damaging their building we must immediately remove it. It was leaning over and resting on the gutter. I wrote back and said they had been informed of the possibility and had damaged the tree regardless. Madam wrote back and said they had not been responsible for damage during building work and it was demised on our land so it was down to us. So we did it. We liked the house occupants.

I have moved to a village built around trees all over the place. The number of people who move in and demand that trees be removed or drastically cut back is amazing. Why come here if they don't like the surroundings? There seem to be people who see trees as a moveable part of the landscape, not a living thing which may be several centuries old. And it doesn't matter if it's on someone else's land. They don't like it, it's got to go.
They really ought to find a home somewhere else.

You’re not quite right. A landowner has a duty of care to ensure their tree isn’t a danger to people or property. A danger is not the same thing as pushing up paving slabs. Suggesting they may have a legal case against me because they put paving slabs and a shed over the roots of a mature tree is laughable and wrong.

You can cut back overhanging branches and roots under common law but if it kills the tree in doing so then the person cutting could face a criminal damage charge. In fact, I’ve just seen something on Reddit where a neighbour has deliberately cut and poisoned the roots of the OP’s trees causing them to die and the legal advice is that they should report as criminal damage.

Thank goodness for people like you op. Glad you've left the tree alone. Just ignore them.

When was the last time you had it professionally trimmed/crowned etc, OP?

It's not fair on neighbours to just ignore them for decades. To remain healthy, a tree needs attention from a tree surgeon periodically.

I’m going to try speaking to the council again about a TPO.

You do realise you'd then have to apply and get council permission every time you needed to trim it, don't you, which is a right royal pain in the arse.

Unless you have no intention of looking after it and just want a TPO as you think it gives you an excuse not to have it professionally trimmed every few years??

I agree with this. Try and get TPOs on the whole strip of trees. Pruning old trees is a skill in itself, the Sycamores will need to be veteranised, pruned carefully to ensure stability and longevity. I have a huge Sycamore that’s over a century old, and I am having this done as it has lost the odd limb and become lopsided. It needs some attention now.

I’m not sure that you are allowed to damage the roots of trees

which they are perfectly entitled to do
so a camera would be completely pointless

You most certainly are. You are perfectly
entitled to cut and roots and overhanging branches at the point where they cross the boundary onto your land.

If they are causing damage to your property, you not only are legally entitled to do so you may even be able to take a legal action against the tree owner for the cost of root mitigation and any damages if the tree owner had a record of refusing to prune their tree. Just like a dangerously out of control dog, owners are responsible for any of their out of control plants that cause damage to a neighbour’s property.

Grey rock him

The subject is not up for discussion