COMHAIRLE CONTAE ÁTHA CLIATH THEAS
SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

South Dublin County Council Crest

MEETING OF SOUTH DUBLIN COUNTY COUNCIL

Monday, November 12, 2018

QUESTION NO. 10

QUESTION: Councillor R. McMahon

To ask the Chief Executive how many full time and part time tree crews are operating in the County currently and to give a report on tree management in the County. Information required please.

How many trees are on the approved list waiting to be pruned or removed and how does this compare to last year and to the previous year?

Also to ask if the County tree survey and registration of each tree on a database ever completed and if so, is available in a summary format?  

REPLY:

There is currently a sufficient number of general services staff assigned to the Tree Management Programme to provide for the assignment of 3 permanent tree crews working across the whole of the County.  In addition there are additional trained staff available to ensure that the crews operate when there is a shortfall of regular staff available to the fulltime crews. It will be possible during the month of November to assign additional crews to tree maintenance for the winter period and in this regard it is expected that an additional 4 crews will be available from the depots to work on the tree management programme for the 3 month period over the winter.

The following table summarises the tree maintenance works carried out in 2016, 2017 and to the end of September 2018.

 

2016

2017

End Sept 2018

Trees pruned

1616

1404

1597

Trees removed

706

691

888

A full update of the tree maintenance work completed is available on the Council’s website where the work remaining to be done on the current tree maintenance programme is also set out in detail.  This is given in terms of locations and estates done or not done as the case may be, however the numbers of trees yet to be pruned or removed cannot be given without a detailed survey having been conducted in the first instance.

The surveying of trees within the County is ongoing with over 15,500 trees now surveyed out of an estimate of 60,000 street trees. Priority is given to surveying the trees on the Tree Maintenance Programme. The tree surveys are logged in the Council’s Tree Management System and provide the basis for the tree maintenance work.  It is intended that additional resources will be provided in this area in 2019 in an effort to move this matter on.