Trees on Council land

Growing our urban forest

Leafy green streetscapes and parks full of majestic, mature trees are the cornerstone of life in our beautiful city and are one of the reasons Stonnington is such a wonderful place to live.

Across the city we manage more than 55,000 trees, representing 520 species - in our parks, in our streets, at community facilities and at the Malvern Valley Golf Course.

All our trees are managed and maintained in accordance with our Urban Forest Strategy(PDF, 6MB) and Street Tree Policy(PDF, 859KB).

Boulevard planting program

We operate an annual boulevard planting program to create and enhance significant boulevards of trees across the city.

Avenues of signature trees are created progressively, with tree removal and replacement happening in stages over a number of years. This way we will achieve our long-term vision of a signature boulevard without a sudden loss of canopy cover.

Street tree planting program

Our annual street tree planting program sees us planting trees on nature strips across the city - improving tree canopy, encouraging biodiversity and cooling our residential streets and retail precincts.

Limited space both on the ground and above, is a major challenge to growing large trees in highly urbanised environments. But with clever design and engineering solutions, we continue to increase the number of street trees across the city.

Helping street trees survive and thrive

Hot dry summer weather can impact the health and viability of our beautiful street trees.

Your help by giving your local street tree an occasional bucket of water will go a long way to helping these beautiful community assets survive and thrive during the hot summer months.

A bucket of water, particularly on extremely hot days (35°C and above), will help the tree remain healthy and grow properly.

Important: Please do not water without first assessing the soil moisture around the tree. If the area is dry, gently use a garden fork to aerate the soil around the tree and apply enough water to moisten the soil to around 30 to 40cm deep.

If you’re concerned about the health or safety of a local street tree please Report It to us.

Tree renewal program

A vast proportion of the trees we manage across the city are classed as mature or, in some cases, over-mature.

While 94 per cent of our trees are classified as being in good health, trees nearing the end of their lives have reduced environmental and aesthetic benefits, pose a greater risk of failure and obstruct our ability to replace the tree stock with new, robust specimens.

As part of our continuous tree monitoring program, we identify unhealthy trees and proactively manage them by mulching, treating for pests or diseases, deep watering or adding additional nutrients. Unfortunately, removal is the only option in some cases, which is only done as a last resort.

To ensure the health and wellbeing of our trees and to continue to increase tree canopy cover across the city our focus is to:

• plant and establish young trees
• maintain semi-mature trees
• retain and protect healthy mature trees
• remove trees that have reached the end of their useful lives.

Tree maintenance program

We operate a year-round tree maintenance program to ensure all our street trees are maintained to the highest possible standard.

Our regular pruning program helps keep trees healthy and ensures they are kept away from power lines, street signs, vehicles and pedestrians.

We have assessed all streets across the city to determine the frequency we need to inspect and prune the street trees, and categorised those streets as 'annual streets' and 'biennial streets'.

• Annual streets - trees need to be inspected and pruned once a year. This accounts for around 6,000 trees across the city.
• Biennial streets - trees need to be inspected and pruned every two years. This accounts for around 21,000 trees across the city.

Maintenance in your neighbourhood

We'll let you know of any upcoming maintenance in your neighbourhood by mailing you a postcard two to three weeks before we commence pruning.

Work may cause some temporary inconvenience, and we thank you in advance for your patience and understanding.

Use the below map to view the pruning schedule in your area.

Once you know your area, the following table shows the yearly schedule for all areas.

Tree safety

We manage our tree population in line with a defined tree risk management framework, which involves:

• identifying trees we are responsible for
• maintaining a tree register of trees we are responsible for
• determining tree risk ratings
• developing a proactive tree inspection regime
• developing risk-based proactive tree inspection processes
• undertaking risk-mitigation works within an agreed time-frame
• maintaining records of risk-mitigation works
• periodically reviewing the tree risk management framework

Using this approach our tree management regime includes:

• tree planting
• tree establishment
• formative pruning
• uplift and clearance pruning
• tree inspection
• pest and disease treatment
• tree removal
• emergency response.

We reduce identified risks to an acceptable level by:

• selecting, positioning and planting trees to reduce long-term risk
• implementing best-practice tree management to mitigate risk to people and property
• undertaking proactive and systematic inspections based on a risk profile and, where potential risks are identified completing risk mitigation works
• maintaining accurate records on the management of our tree assets.

Find out more about tree maintenance and pruning schedule.

An Electric Line Clearance Management Plan(PDF, 2MB) is also in place to ensure our tree assets comply with the Electricity Safety (Line Clearance) Regulations 2020.

If you're concerned about the health or safety of a street tree or a tree in a local park please Report It to us.