Question
There is a history of lack of foresight within the Council such as installing new LED lights on London Road a few months before the road was widened leaving the lampposts stranded in the middle of the inside lane rather than on the pavement.
Likewise, a large number of trees have been planted in the past couple of decades and subsequently uprooted or scheduled for felling even though it was known at the time of planting that those trees were in the way of planned developments. Would you please inform me how many trees, and at what cost, have been planted during this period only to be scheduled for demolition relatively shortly afterwards.
Minutes:
There is a history of lack of foresight within the council such as installing new LED lights on London Road a few months before the road was widened leaving the lampposts stranded in the middle of the inside lane rather than on the pavement.
Likewise, a large number of trees have been planted in the past couple of decades and subsequently uprooted or scheduled for felling even though it was known at the time of planting that those trees were in the way of planned developments. Would you please inform me how many trees, and at what cost, have been planted during this period only to be scheduled for demolition relatively shortly afterwards.
Answer
The Council’s street lighting replacement project was planned prior to the Coppid Beech part of the Northern Distributor Road being agreed by the developer. Had the two schemes been contemporary they would have joined up via our collaborative planning process and abortive works prevented. The timing in this case did not allow for this and we are therefore making sure that all the materials are reused, that is the lamp columns, light heads and the controllers, and any damage will be replaced at the developer’s expense.
When highway works are done, the Council requires that appropriate landscaping is carried out. Where new works become desirable it is regrettable that original landscaping may need to be removed, however we ensure appropriate new landscaping is installed as part of this process. Any trees cut down can be used.
We do not retain records which itemise the detail and cost of works in the form that you have requested.
Supplementary Question:
I would like an answer to the first question really because it is specifically about the trees. I will give you an actual couple of examples which might well change your answer. Planning permission for the Plough Lane housing development required that a SANG was built and that meant several hundred trees were planted in the line of the new North Wokingham Development routes. The Council were clearly aware that the road was going to be built at the time. It is on this Council map which I can show you afterwards. I did point it out to several Officers at the time, and likewise at the western end of said road, the Millennium Wood is going to be destroyed by the same road and that was also known about at the time because this route has been long planned. I have clearly stated that this proposed route was known before these trees were planted, thousands of them in fact. What I want to know is why the Council do not plan ahead, wasting public money planting these trees when they knew they were going to uproot them not that long afterwards, and are there any more examples? I know of these two and there are probably several others.
Supplementary Answer:
You cannot just sit around for any developments and not do anything else. I think also trees, we grow trees, we crop them and we use them for other things, so it is not a disaster when that sort of thing happens. So I think trees get planted and trees get cut down.