Tree rules in Haringey: preservation orders and conservation areas

This page reports what the official source says. It is not legal advice: ask the office named here. It describes three Haringey Council pages and the council's Tree and Woodland Plan, as read on October 8, 2026. The national rules, including the time limits in the England regulations, are on the guide to checking tree rules with UK councils. This page covers only what Haringey's pages add.

Checking for an order

Haringey's TPO page says an order means written consent is needed to cut down, uproot, cut back branches of, or damage or destroy a tree, including cutting its roots, and that bushes and shrubs cannot be covered. To check, the page offers an interactive map of trees with orders, a search of the public register using the Tree Preservation Orders category, and the planning team at the Development Management Support Team in Wood Green. One line is particular to boundaries: the page says protected trees on boundaries may be registered under a neighbouring address, so neighbouring sites are worth checking as well. The page describes itself as covering what an order is, how to apply for one, work on a protected tree, conservation areas and development sites, and reporting unauthorised work.

Council trees and problems

The tree protection page says thousands of the borough's trees have a formal order, and describes the council's own care: watering 30 to 50 trees a day and more in drought, weeding round young trees, mulching about 10cm deep and 50cm round the tree, coppicing and pollarding. It says trees that are dying, badly diseased, or unplanned and growing too close to buildings are cut down, that the most common disease in the borough is Ganoderma fungi, and that a tree cut for disease is replaced. A companion page about protecting trees from being cut down says the new Local Plan is developing a dedicated trees policy and an additional council tree officer for planning matters.

The report page says a fallen tree that risks injury or life goes to 999, other problems go through the online account, and the council inspects reported tree problems within 10 days and then says what action it will take. It states that the work can take up to 8 weeks depending on urgency. For a tree said to be damaging property, the page says the first step is the insurer, whose evidence of structural damage is then sent to the council's insurance section. A street tree felling page lists trees under duty-to-consult and, when read, showed one final decision for a road in N4.

What the Tree and Woodland Plan states

The plan is dated August 2022. It puts the street trees at approximately 11,500, with 9,000 in parks and greenspaces and 8,000 on housing sites, and at least another 5,000 to 6,000 in woodlands, schools and nature sites that are not recorded. Its inspection policy says street trees and housing site trees follow a planned inspection regime: street trees on a three to four year cycle depending on species, location and root damage risk, trees in parks and open spaces on a three year cycle, and housing estate trees every four years. The trees on the three year street cycle are mostly plane and lime near buildings that have been managed as pollards. After the Witley Parish Council v Cavanagh case in 2018, the plan says the council proposes inspecting high-risk roadside trees at least every 2 years and ideally every 18 months, once in leaf and once out. It states an aim to plant street trees until each ward reaches 30 percent canopy cover, and an objective to meet timelines for answering TPO work applications and conservation area notices.

Tree rules in Haringey: preservation orders and conservation areas

Checking for an order

Council trees and problems

What the Tree and Woodland Plan states

Sources