City plane trees face the chop as Melbourne City Council diversifies green canopy

MELBOURNE is set to eventually lose most of its ­traditional plane trees under a city council plan to diversify its green canopy.

Plane trees on Flinders St between Fed Square and Spring St have been cut down by the council due to damage from cars. Picture: Jay Town

MELBOURNE is set to eventually lose most of its ­traditional plane trees under a city council plan to diversify its green canopy.

Sixteen London plane trees have just been removed from Flinders St above the rail yards after the council said they had been damaged by vehicles and posed a safety risk.

They will be replaced by 20 lemon-scented gums as part of streetscape works that will include a new tram super stop between Russell and Exhibition streets.

Melbourne City Council ­environment portfolio chairman Arron Wood said the council had taken advantage of the need for the tram stop to bring forward works under its urban forest strategy.

“Even though it’s always sad to lose big mature trees like that, those 16 trees will be replaced with 20 so we’ll actually get a better outcome in the long term,” he said.

About 75 per cent of the inner city’s trees are planes, but the urban forest long-term plan aims for one species to have no more than 5 per cent coverage.

The felled plane trees leave a gaping hole.

Almost half of the city’s tree population will be lost over the next 20 years due mainly to extreme heat, damage and ageing, providing the opportunity to diversify the stock.

Mr Wood said the council had added 15 new species over the past four years, with a total of 12,000 trees planted.

“When you’ve got too much of one species, it leaves it ­susceptible to disease, and also leaves (the city susceptible) to the urban heat island effect,” he said.

“The more diversity you can get, the more resilient are your trees.”

It was revealed last year that the council injects its plane trees with hormones in a bid to make them less irritating for allergy sufferers.

The city’s tree canopy would be increased from 22 per cent now to 40 per cent by 2040 under the urban forest strategy, while trees removed from heritage parks and spaces would be replaced with similar species.

Mr Wood said that the strategy had been picked up by other councils around Australia, and later this month the council would launch a special template that municipalities could use to develop their own urban forest plans.

The council owns about 70,000 trees, which are worth an estimated $650 million.

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