Over 110,000 trees cut down by councils in three years

A Sunday Times investigation has found that more than 110,000 trees have been chopped down in three years by councils across the UK, with Newcastle the most prolific.

With Sheffield City Council regularly in the news for felling 10 per cent of its street tree population, often facing protesters over plans to chop up to 17,000 street trees, the freedom of information requests by the newspaper have found that Sheffield is listed as third for the cities most prolific at tree felling.

Sheffield, whose rate stands at 3,529, is exceeded by Newcastle, where 8,414 trees have been felled, and Edinburgh, where 4,435 trees have been felled. There are an estimated 800,000 trees in Newcastle, with Newcastle City Council claiming that 0.35 per cent of its tree stock had therefore been felled in each of the past three years.

A Newcastle council spokesman is reported as saying: “Where trees have been felled this has been for a good reason or where this has been necessary – where trees are dead, diseased or dangerous or where we have a new development scheme. In most of these cases replanting schemes are required. We have 7,000 trees with protection orders (TPO) and 718 group TPOs.”