Protection for trees will be 'up to landowner'

Auckland City landowners will be able to choose whether trees on their property are protected under proposed changes to the Resource Management Act.

Auckland City development committee chairman Aaron Bhatnagar said that while it was technically a political decision, in most cases his committee would not add trees to its protected list without the owner's consent.

"We can't force a homeowner to have a tree scheduled [for protection] because that would be a significant breach of their property rights."

An exception might be a "particularly magnificent tree" that was threatened by a developer.

Under the Resource Management (Simplifying and Streamlining) Amendment Bill, the only way to protect a tree on private land using the district plan is to list it in a schedule.

General rules protecting all trees of a particular size or type - such as those used by Auckland, North Shore, Waitakere and Manukau cities - would have to be phased out by January 1, 2012.

At the moment councils deal with about 4000 resource consents a year to trim or fell trees covered by general rules, causing frustration for some home owners caught up in delays.

Councils have warned that few of the hundreds of thousands of Auckland trees covered by general rules will be able to be protected under the new rules.

That could leave Waitakere's urban native bush and the North Shore's coastal pohutukawa, for example, open to felling.

The Tree Council in Auckland, which fought to get general protection rules, has said councils will be flooded with requests to list particular trees if the law is changed.

It can cost $500 to $5000 to schedule a tree and the listing must go through the process for a district plan change.

Mr Bhatnagar said his council was taking suggestions for new trees and groups of trees that could be scheduled.