The first step in zoning for trees is to set aside a percentage of land on each building site so trees will have a place to grow their roots and spread their branches. Twenty percent is a good number.

The literature suggests that nature in the city provides many public services. Trees enhance biodiversity, reduce atmospheric carbon, improve water quality, filter the air, and enrich the soil. In addition, carefully preserved trees moderate the climate, and can soak-up toxic chemicals from the environment. A community that is zoned for trees is a healthier place to live.

Healthy communities that are supportive of wildlife are also more environmentally efficient, that is, the energy of the sun and its ability to generate biomass is in equilibrium with forces of nature or mankind that work to destroy nature. Sustainability is the measure of a healthy city and trees do their part in keeping a community healthy.

A city without trees is not as healthy, primarily because the actions of mankind to develop urban land remove or alter the natural systems that sustain and support human life.

Everyone would agree that a village is healthier than a town, a town is healthier than a city and a city is by far a healthier place to live than a mega-city.

The more paved a city becomes, the less opportunity there is for nature's systems of soils, water, atmosphere, vegetation, animal life and climate to work for the health of mankind. And as a bonus, a healthy city is tranquil, relaxing and refreshing to the human spirit by simply adding beauty to the surroundings.

Zoning dates back to the 1880s. It was a tool created and upheld by the courts to ensure orderly growth, community health and to allow for more livable places.

Woodlands that are preserved under zoning law within cities provide habitat for animals and create desirable living and working places for citizens. New tree plantings increase property value, attract shoppers to businesses and provide relief from summer sun and tropical storms. The simple act of planting a tree will lessen the demand for energy, decrease cooling costs for any building and the cost savings will far outweigh the original cost of the planting.

Trees provide many benefits useful to society other than beauty and zoning is the tool to make this happen.

To preserve nature in the city, tree regulations must be contained within a community's zoning ordinance.

Zoning for Trees
Communities who manage their urban forests and preserve nature in the city do so through zoning. To keep a city healthy, it must be zoned to preserve trees and other vegetation and maintain an appropriate percentage of undeveloped land in which nature is allowed to fully function.

Zoning of sensitive lands, lands containing many trees, is something that cities should do, and have the authority to do. But some communities do not, since they do not understand how to zone for trees. Planning commissioners and professional planners ensure that nature in the city is cared for by enacting comprehensive landscape codes that specify minimum standards for the preservation of nature in the city. This is done especially in regard to trees and rebuilt landscapes. To maintain trees it is important to have site development regulations that control land clearing, encourage habitat preservation, and require tree protection of special trees, water conservation and onsite storm water management.

In recent years, city after city across the nation have turned to this type of local regulatory tool as a means of ensuring better site design and acceptable community design standards for its green infrastructure.

To preserve nature in the city, tree regulations must be contained within a community's zoning ordinance. Therefore, zoning for trees can be seen as basic zoning criterion. Zoning for trees and places on building sites in which they may grow can complement the traditional zoning prerogatives of use, intensity, density, and lot size, as well as building bulk, height and setback. Curiously, many cities do not have their tree regulations as part of zoning. But landscape codes are always included in zoning, especially buffering and screening.

Zoned "plantable spaces' are now part of the primary components of modern day zoning.

The first step in zoning for trees is to set aside a percentage of land on each building site so trees will have a place to grow their roots and spread their branches. Twenty percent is a good number. AmericanForests.org suggests a percentage based upon zoning districts.

Zoning for trees may be referred to as enacting "green laws' within a city. Green laws are a sobriquet for regulations that preserve, protect or rebuild nature in the city. Green laws are generally of three types: landscape regulations, tree ordinances or comprehensive land development codes. All three maintain nature and promote the planting of trees as an essential element of any community's green infrastructure system.

It might therefore be said that when King John of England conceived the Charter of the Forest before his death in 1216, he zoned the Royal Forests of Norman England for trees.

Readers may contact the author at lsugreenlaws@aol.com, or call Abbey Associates Landscape Architecture at 225-766-0924.