Urban Forestry in London

New Urban Forestry Section Created at City Hall

Through the Service Review Committee a number of recommendations to improve our forestry services, provided to Londoners and streamline many administrative and operations processes, will be implemented over the next year. As a member of the Review Committee I have long been concerned that we must create more efficient services in this area of the city and this means we will be more cost efficient too.

One of our priorities is to create an Urban Forestry Section that will oversee London’s “urban forest” and direct all aspects of tree planning, planting and maintenance. Many of you will understand the need for this both from the public perspective and observation of how our staff are stretch thinly.

The Urban Forestry Section will be established in the Planning Division under John Fleming and headed by Ivan Listar – Manager of Urban Forestry. The new Section is located at 383 Richmond St. Suite 1102 , where Parks Planning & Design is situated. Roadside Operations will continue to maintain our trees and will expand their role into tree planting operations. Urban Forestry will have an increased role in strategic planning and development of policies, guidelines and standards.

This one of the first major changes to come from our Services Review Committee, chaired by my colleague Nancy Branscombe. The purpose is to work through all city service to find efficiencies and saving to provide even better service to Londoners. It is pleasure to serve on this committee and meet many of our management team who are also working to find ways of meeting greater demands from our knowlegable citizens.