I recently emailed the council about the unfortunate lack of trees to the areas outside the station and along HOP parade.

Adding a few trees in these important areas would make all the difference.

It is frustrating to know how relatively inexpensive it is to pop in a few trees, and I don't understand why the council or councillors ..or someone hasn't pushed for more planting.

The representative from 'Greenscene' states the possible reason for no trees is either underground services or not being able to have trees near a crossing (even though this occurs on the other side of the railway bridge with no problems (the blossom trees). I think this is a weak excuse to not bother.

A community fund for something simple like tree planting may be a good idea to greatly improve our local environment.



my email:

Please could I ask if Lewisham intends to develop a strategy for tree planting in the area of Honor Oak Park parade and station? – Please find attached sketch plan .

The dark green areas highlight existing attractive tree planting. The light green areas are current swathes of empty looking pavement that would benefit from tree planting. The individual dots show where the existing road side planting is degraded and requires replacement measures.

I was particularly concerned that Lewisham didn’t compel sainsburys to provide tree planting to the exterior of their shop frontage.

On the plan I have highlighted the station entrance / gateway to honor oak park with a purple dot and the sainsburys (orange) and various community eateries that would benefit from tree planting to improve the sitting out experience.

The opportunity to introduce tree planting to the station gateway on the very wide pavements and central area between the two road lanes is a missed one at present – and would greatly benefit an already up and coming area.

If your response is simply there is no money for it – please could you advise on expected costs for a improvement tree planting scheme in the area and I will look to see if there are any ways to raise funds or community awareness of the situation.

The Reply from 'Greenscene' Lewisham:

Thank you for your enquiry and attached map.

Currently the tree team have a limited budget for planting (we do manage some every year, but the bulk of the budget we have has to be spent on maintenance and upkeep of our tree stock which is very large).

Additionally, the following can be done to enable tree planting

1) Residents can approach their local ward assembly and request money for planting. If a bid is successful the cost of a tree is £240 and residents take the responsibility of watering the tree for a period of two years. Information about your local assembly and when/where it is next due to meet can be found on http://www.lewisham.gov.uk/getinvolved/l...fault.aspx

2) Residents can bypass the assembly process and make a personal contribution cost is higher as £360 per tree. If residents take the responsibility of watering the tree for a period of two years the cost is £240.

3) Bids for external funding are carried out by local community groups who then work in partnership with the council in relation to locating sites and ordering the trees etc

4) The council applies for monies for national initiatives.

In cases 1), 2) and 3) the tree is a contribution as such and not owned by residents as the tree will fall within the council's tree maintenance programme and be the council's responsibility in terms of pruning etc.

All planting sites have to be scanned and assessed in relation to:

- underground utility cabling that prohibits planting (there is, unfortunately, a lot of this due to the supplies of gas/water/cable tv/electrics feeding parking meters etc). Historically - swathes such as those on your map are not planted up because there is a lot of servicing underground feeding the shops (and other items such as those listed below). It can be sadly deceiving when looking at large wide pavements and envisaging planting as it is often not possible (we had a similar situation in Crofton park a couple of seasons ago when a resident successfully bid for ward assembly funds as the stretch of Brockley Road he wanted to use was prohibitive..even though it looked the opposite... so surrounding streets were used.

- Site lines.. planting cannot take place too close to corners/zebra crossings as this can cause a driving hazard to people trying to pull out


- The presence of lamp posts, notice posts, bollards, electrical boxes, parking meters etc

- Light infringement - planting between properties, rather than in front of them to reduce impact on light

- The presence of other significant vegetation in gardens adjacent to the pavement - trees and significantly large shrubbery compete for light/water etc so should not be planted close together

- Parking associated issues: the presence of crossovers prohibits planting.


- Rear garden access doors at the bottom of side alleys which cannot be blocked

I have looked at our database and the visual below would support my suspicion of planting prohibition.. given the limited trees and the absence of any recorded vacant tree pits.

If you wish to use of the funding avenues above and were successful then I would be very happy to liaise with you in relation to scanning sites to make sure - in the absence of any potentials on this strip others would need to be found.Usually residents liaise re assembly initiatives as this enables site sourcing/species consultation and information gathering (such as water volunteers etc) and if sites are not already established we loan out the scanner if needed.

I am attaching some species/watering information as it is useful to have should you wish to liaise with other residents and the ward assembly. If you are successful in any bid please let me know and I will start collating the information. We usually plant in the cold months -mid october-beginning december and Jan-early march - we do not plant in the summer. Therefore all sites/species should ideally be agreed for ordering purposes by mid September.

If you have any more queries please don't hesitate to ask.

Yours Sincerely

Green Scene

Well done tincan for engaging in a conversation with them although maybe their answer came close to sucking dry any enthusiasm you originally had.

Please stick with this and you will be a local hero!