The Burnley method of tree valuation: cone volume, base value and three reduction factors
How an ISA journal study, a University of Melbourne paper and the Australia and New Zealand valuation standard describe the Burnley method, an Australian formula that values a tree from the volume of its crown and the price of nursery stock.
Checked against the sources at the bottom of this page on October 9, 2026. Rules, fees and pay change: the source has the last word.
This page reports what the official source says. It is not legal advice: ask the office named here. It describes the Burnley method as the sources named here word it, on pages and documents read on October 9, 2026. It does not value any tree and gives no base value, because the sources publish none that can be used here. Other published methods are set side by side on the page comparing CAVAT and i-Tree Eco, and two more are on the pages for the Helliwell system and the Standard Tree Evaluation Method.
Where the method comes from
A study published in Arboriculture and Urban Forestry in January 2002 describes the Revised Burnley Method as developed at the Victorian College of Agriculture and Horticulture Limited, Burnley Campus, in Australia. It says the method was first published in 1988 by McGarry and Moore and revised in 1991 by Moore. The study calls it similar in concept to the method in the US Guide for Plant Appraisal, because both start from tree size and a unit money value and then reduce the figure.
The formula as the sources give it
The 2002 study says tree size is measured as the volume of the tree, approximated by an inverted cone. The volume is multiplied by the cost per cubic metre of retail nursery stock, which the study says is presumably of the same species. That gives a maximum value, which is then reduced by three factors.
| Part of the formula | Range given in the 2002 study | What it stands for |
|---|---|---|
| Tree volume | Not a rated factor | The volume of a cone |
| Base value | Not a rated factor | Price of retail nursery stock per cubic metre |
| Life expectancy | 0.5 to 1.0 | Useful life expectancy of the tree |
| Form and vigour | 0.0 to 1.0 | Arboricultural judgement of form and vigour |
| Location | 0.4 to 1.0 | How suitable the tree is for its place |
The study says that, as in the US method, every factor reduces the base value, but that unlike the US method not every factor can bring the value to zero. It adds that for life expectancy the appraisers in its exercise were free to use whatever method they felt was appropriate.
The 2005 revision in the Australian draft
A paper by Dr G M Moore, then Head of the School of Resource Management and Burnley Campus at the University of Melbourne, was given at the 7th National Street Tree Symposium in 2006. It reports that Standards Australia had convened a working committee in 2005 and circulated a draft, document EV 01800-00-02, Draft Amenity Trees, Guide to Valuation. The committee's approach, in the paper's words, included a revised and abbreviated Burnley method. The paper sets out the formula in these terms: final tree value in Australian dollars equals the volume of the cone, times a base tree value per cubic metre, times useful life expectancy (0.5 to 1.0), times form and vigour (0.00 to 1.00), times a location modifier (0.4 to 1.0). It says the base value is worked out from prices for advanced trees of the same or related species per unit of volume.
The paper also records that earlier drafts of an Australian Standard for amenity tree valuation, in 1992 and 1999, had been circulated without being adopted, and that a draft prepared in 2004 was withdrawn by its committee before wide circulation, and that the 2006 draft offered three alternative non-replacement formulae: the revised 1992 draft, the revised Burnley method and the Thyer method. It says Burnley and Thyer had performed well in several comparative studies. What became of that draft after 2006 is not stated on the pages read.
How it performed when appraisers used it
In the 2002 study, nine people appraised six trees at the Morton Arboretum in Lisle, Illinois, on September 23, 1999, using five formula methods from five countries. The study reports that the Burnley and STEM methods were not significantly different from each other on four of the six trees and gave consistently much higher values than the US and Helliwell methods. It notes that Burnley measures size as crown volume, an exponential calculation, and that the other factors seemed to influence value as much as size or more. On species, it says the method works only through indirect measures and the price of nursery stock, and that these did not account for a threefold difference in value between an American elm and a pin oak of similar size.
Where the standard covers it
MIS506, the Minimum Industry Standard for Tree Valuation produced by Arboriculture Australia Ltd and the New Zealand Arboricultural Association, lists the Burnley method first among the selected methods in its section 5, with subsections on applications and context and on method. The same section lists the City of Melbourne method, the method of the Council of Tree and Landscape Appraisers, i-Tree Eco, STEM and the Thyer method. The association says the book covers the core standards of tree valuation for arborists in Australia and New Zealand. The full method text is in the book, not on its shop page.
Sources
- Arboriculture and Urban Forestry (ISA), Comparing Formula Methods of Tree Appraisal, Gary Watson, volume 28 issue 1, January 2002, read October 9, 2026
- University of Melbourne (Burnley), Urban Tree Valuation: a current perspective and progress report, Dr G M Moore, 7th National Street Tree Symposium 2006, read October 9, 2026
- New Zealand Arboricultural Association, MIS506 Tree Valuation contents page, read October 9, 2026
- Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, Comparing Formula Methods of Tree Appraisal (reprint of the 2002 article), read October 9, 2026