Coventry City Council SPD correctly defines ancient and veteran trees
Coventry City Council’s SPD Trees and Development Guidelines for Coventry correctly defines ancient and veteran trees. Early drafts of this document had sought to define veteran trees according to the Planning Practice Guidance (Natural Environment), which contains significant departures from the definition provided in Annex 2 of the NPPF. Initially, Officers sought to maintain (incorrectly) that the PPG definition took precedence, but following Reps submitted by Sylvan, the key passage in the SPD now states:
It is acknowledged that in defining ancient and veteran trees, the NPPF takes primacy and the associated PPG should be read alongside it. The definition of Ancient and Veteran Trees is set out in Annex 2 – Glossary of the NPPF. The key features of both types of tree include the aspects of exceptional biodiversity, culture and heritage value. All ancient trees are veteran trees. Not all veteran trees are old enough to be ancient but are old relative to other trees of the same species.
Click here to download a copy of the SPD.
This is an important decision by Coventry City Council: confirmation of the primacy of the NPPF definition indirectly provides further endorsement for the RAVEN methodology developed by Sylvan co-founder Julian Forbes-Laird, as this is designed to identify ancient & veteran trees in alignment with the Framework.
