A tree protection plan checklist to BS 5837

A tree protection plan is a scale drawing, not a written statement. It has to show every retained tree, the root protection area around each one, the line of protective fencing, any ground protection under a site access route, and the construction exclusion zone that follows from all of it. Run through the tree protection plan checklist below before your application goes in. The commonest reason these drawings are sent back is simple: the fencing line drawn by the arboriculturist does not match the scaffold, crane or drainage layout drawn by everyone else.

BS 5837:2012 is the standard councils name. It sits behind the Arboricultural Impact Assessment and the arboricultural method statement, and the protection plan is the drawing that makes both of them enforceable on site.

What the plan has to show

The plan is built on top of the tree constraints plan produced at survey stage, with the proposed layout dropped underneath it. At a minimum a case officer expects to see the retained trees numbered to match the survey schedule, the trees to be removed shown differently, root protection areas drawn to scale, protective fencing with its type annotated, ground protection areas hatched, and the position of site huts, material stores, spoil heaps and the wheel wash.

Scale matters more than people expect. A plan at 1:500 cannot show a fence line to the accuracy a condition will later be judged against, so use 1:200 for a single plot and 1:100 for anything tight against a boundary.

Two things get left off almost every first draft. The first is levels: where the ground is being cut or filled near a retained tree, the plan needs spot levels or a note tying it to the engineer's drawing. The second is the neighbour's tree. Canopies and roots cross boundaries, and a tree on adjoining land with a root protection area extending into your site has to appear on the plan whether or not you can survey it.

Root protection areas and how they are drawn

For a single-stem tree the root protection area is the area of a circle whose radius is 12 times the stem diameter, measured at 1.5 m above ground level, capped at 707 m². That cap is the figure most people forget. It means a very large mature oak does not generate an infinite exclusion zone, though 707 m² is still roughly a 15 m radius, which is larger than many back gardens.

Multi-stem trees use the combined stem diameter method in the standard rather than the largest stem. Get this wrong on a multi-stem field maple and the area can be out by a third.

The standard allows the shape of the area to be modified where soil conditions, existing structures or an obvious physical barrier mean roots cannot be where the circle says they are. What it does not allow is a reduction in the total area. So a root protection area squeezed on one side by an existing garage slab has to be extended on the other, and the plan should say why. Officers read that note carefully, because a modified area drawn without justification is the standard route to a refusal reason about inadequate tree information. Where an incursion into the area cannot be avoided, the arboriculturist has to say what proportion of the rooting volume is affected, what the tree can tolerate given its age and condition, and what mitigation applies.

For householder work the practical detail sits in the relationship between the extension footprint and the circle. Our note on extensions near trees and root protection areas works through where the foundation solution changes.

Fencing, ground protection and the exclusion zone

Default protective fencing under the standard is a 2.4 m high vertical and horizontal scaffold framework with welded mesh panels wired to it, braced to resist impact, standing on the root protection area boundary. Annotate the fence type on the plan and cross-reference the detail drawing. All-weather notices reading "Construction exclusion zone - no access" go on the fence, and the plan should note where.

Lighter fencing is sometimes acceptable, for example a 1.2 m post and mesh line on a small domestic site with no heavy plant. That is a judgement for the arboriculturist, and it needs a reason on the drawing rather than a silent substitution.

Ground protection is what you use where access across part of a root protection area cannot be avoided. Typical specifications are scaffold boards on a scaffold frame, proprietary interlocking panels, or a geotextile layer with granular fill above it, each sized for the loading it will actually see. Pedestrian access and a 20-tonne excavator do not share a specification.

No-dig surfaces and special engineering

Where a driveway, footpath or parking bay has to sit inside a root protection area, the answer is normally a no-dig construction: a cellular confinement system or three-dimensional geogrid laid on a geotextile over the existing grade, with sharp angular fill, built up rather than dug down. Existing soil levels stay where they are and the finished surface rises.

That rise has consequences the plan has to resolve. A no-dig driveway typically finishes 150 mm to 300 mm above existing ground, which affects thresholds, gully positions and the transition to the highway. If the engineer has designed a flush threshold and the arboriculturist has designed a no-dig build-up, one of them is about to be redesigned, and it is cheaper to find out before submission.

Foundations inside or close to the area follow the same logic. Screw piles, mini piles with a suspended slab, or a cantilevered beam spanning past the rooting zone all appear regularly in approved schemes. Each needs a section drawing and a line in the method statement covering how the piling rig reaches the position without crossing unprotected ground. Basement work is a category of its own, and we cover it separately in basement excavation and tree root protection areas.

Services, drainage and the conflicts nobody draws

Utility routes are where tree protection plans fall apart at construction stage. The drainage strategy runs a new foul connection along the boundary, the boundary has a line of retained limes, and nobody overlaid the two drawings.

Deal with it on the plan. Show service corridors and note which are outside root protection areas, which will be thrust-bored or hand-dug under arboricultural supervision, and which need a different route. Trenchless techniques and hand-dug trenches with roots over 25 mm retained and wrapped are the two standard answers, and the National Joint Utilities Group guidance on working near trees is what the utility's own site team will expect to be quoted.

Soakaways deserve a specific look. An infiltration feature inside a root protection area is both an excavation and a long-term change to soil moisture, so it usually has to move.

Supervision and monitoring after approval

Most tree conditions require the method statement and protection plan to be approved before any work starts, then complied with throughout. Build the monitoring regime into the documents you submit: who inspects, at what stages, what they record, and who receives the report.

A workable pattern is a pre-commencement inspection once fencing is up and before any plant arrives, then inspections tied to milestones rather than dates, because dates slip and milestones do not. Photographs with the fence and a scale object in frame settle most later arguments about whether the exclusion zone was maintained.

Keep the correspondence. If the council's tree officer agrees a variation on site, get it in writing the same day and issue a revised plan, because a verbal agreement is worth very little when a different officer investigates a complaint two years later.

A pre-submission checklist

Work through this before the application is submitted:

1. Tree numbers on the protection plan match the survey schedule and the removals shown on the layout.
2. Root protection areas are calculated from stem diameters at 1.5 m, with the 707 m² cap applied and multi-stem trees using the combined method.
3. Every modified area carries a written justification on the drawing.
4. Off-site trees with areas crossing the boundary are shown.
5. The fencing line is overlaid against the engineer's drainage, levels and foundation drawings, and against the crane or scaffold position.
6. Ground protection specifications state the loading assumed.
7. No-dig extents match the finished levels on the engineer's sections.
8. Service routes are shown with the technique noted for each incursion.
9. Site facilities, material storage and the wheel wash are located outside all areas.
10. The monitoring schedule names the stages and the recording method.

If you are assembling the wider application pack at the same time, the full list of report types shows which of them a treed site normally triggers alongside the arboricultural work. Councils expect a suitably qualified author for arboricultural documents, and professional review of any draft is strongly advised before it goes in. This is general guidance, not legal advice; check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.