CUTTING down a huge tree divided council planners, with some worried about the environment and others about people's access to their gardens.

An approximately 80-year-old beech tree in a back garden at Forest Road, Risinghurst was set to be chopped down at the end of last year, as residents complained it meant their gardens were inaccessible because of health and safety risks it caused.

When a tree surgeon visited to carry out the work, he checked with Oxford City Council to find out if there was a Tree Preservation Order on the beech tree.

There was not, but Chris Leyland, a tree specialist at the council, made an application to protect the tree after having visited.

But residents of Forest Road successfully appealed to the council’s east area planning committee last Wednesday to allow the tree felling to go ahead.

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Kim Webb, who lives next door, told the committee the tree was a health and safety issue and prevented her from using her garden.

Speaking after the meeting, she said: "I love trees - don't take me wrong. This is not NIMBYism. It is a health and safety issue. It is the fact that I cannot go into my back garden and use it. My dog cannot use it. My neighbours cannot use their gardens."

Ms Webb added: “It has a major detrimental impact on my life and everyone else’s life, and the one main argument of the order was that the tree makes a significant positive impact.”

Ms Webb said the tree's nut husk littered nearby gardens, it cast a huge shadow and its size meant there was a complete lack of TV signal.

She also said falling tree branches had been a danger to her and neighbours.

But a report to the committee said: “The tree appears to be a source of inconvenience and irritation to the tree’s owners and one neighbour.

“However these impacts are relatively minor in scale and are considered to be outweighed by the tree’s positive contribution to public visual amenity and to wider ecosystem service provision.”

Oxford Mail:

The beech tree as seen from Forest Road. Picture: Google Maps.

Council officers asked if the committee wanted to carry out a site visit, but the councillors thought they had heard and seen enough during the meeting to make a decision on the TPO.

They refused permission for the order, though some of them were reluctant to see the tree cut down.

Littlemore councillor John Tanner said: “At the moment, with the climate emergency it is incumbent on us all to plant as many trees as we can, and we have to get used to it."

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But fellow committee member Nigel Chapman questioned whether a blanket approach to saving trees needed to be taken when some were clearly causing issues.

He said: “Having heard the arguments I don’t believe the public value of a tree preservation order is sufficiently strong.

“You are asking on or two individuals to take the hit for the team and I think the hit is too big.”