Yesterday I called the Urban Forestry Service to check on the status of the application to remove the unhealthy tree next door.

The inspector at our local UFS office called today to let me know that the paperwork was only marked as received by their central office today (though it was dropped off on Monday). It will now be forwarded (via letter mail) to the local office and someone will come by next week to inspect the tree.

Once again I should mention that you should count on ‘the system’ to take longer than you might expect to do everything it needs to do. I don’t mean this as a dig towards the government agencies that regulate all the different aspects of a construction project, only that you should remember to allot sufficient time for each group to complete the due diligence required by their mandate.

In speaking with the inspector today we also found out that even though our neighbours authorized the arborist to manage this process with the city, they will still need to sign the final paperwork authorizing the removal of their tree. We had hoped our build would be of as little inconvenience to them as possible, but it looks like we’ll have to impose a little more paperwork on them yet.

(Sorry guys!)

There is also some good news as far as the timeline goes though: In the case where one is applying to remove a tree that the city considers to be unhealthy, there is no 2-week public appeal process. It makes sense now that I think about it: there’s no reason to preserve a tree that is dying and therefore could fall, no matter who would like to see it stay.