Usually, yes, if there are trees on or near your application site. Councils validate planning applications before they consider them, and where a proposal could affect trees they will generally ask for a tree survey to the BS5837:2012 standard as part of that check. Submitting without one rarely means refusal, but it often means delay, because the application can sit unvalidated until the survey arrives. This is general information rather than legal advice, and practice varies between authorities, so check with your council before you submit.
When a council will ask for a tree survey
The trigger is trees on or near the site. That includes trees within the site itself, trees on neighbouring land whose branches or roots reach across the boundary, and trees close enough for foundations, drainage, access or changes in ground level to affect them. The trees do not have to be in the way of the building. A tree that is staying put can still be harmed by construction around it, and that is exactly what the council wants to see assessed.
Whether your particular application needs a survey is the council’s decision, so ask early. As a working assumption, if a tree stands close enough to notice from where the work will happen, be prepared for the council to ask about it.
What validation means, and what a missing survey costs
Validation is the council’s first check of an application: does it include the forms, plans and supporting documents needed before the proposal can be considered at all. A required tree survey is a supporting document like any other. If it is missing, the application is held at that first hurdle. Nobody assesses the merits of your scheme while the council requests the missing information, you commission a survey, and the process picks up again once it is submitted. Weeks can disappear this way on an application that was otherwise ready.
The fix is straightforward: find out whether a survey is needed before you submit, and have it done first. Our surveyors can usually visit within days, not weeks, so the survey rarely needs to be the thing holding an application back.
What a BS5837 survey contains
BS5837:2012 is the standard for surveying trees where development is proposed. A BS5837 tree survey records each tree and gives it a quality grading of A, B, C or U. It works out a root protection area for each tree, the ground around the trunk that construction should keep clear. Those findings are drawn up on a tree constraints plan, showing where the trees and their root protection areas sit in relation to the site.
Depending on the proposal, the council may then want the follow-on documents the standard describes: an arboricultural impact assessment setting out what the scheme would do to the trees, a method statement explaining how work near them will be carried out, and a tree protection plan showing how they will be physically protected while construction happens.
The survey should shape the design, not just record it
The most useful time to commission a survey is before the layout is fixed. The tree constraints plan shows a designer where the better trees stand and where their root protection areas fall, so the scheme can be arranged around them from the start. Done in that order, the survey prevents problems rather than recording them.
Done after the design is settled, it can only report the conflicts. Resolving those can mean redesigning, moving foundations or asking the council to accept the loss of trees it would rather keep, and any of those costs far more time than the survey itself. If you are early in a project with trees on or near the plot, the survey belongs near the top of the list, not the bottom.
Protected trees change the rules
Tree protection runs alongside the planning system, and the two are checked separately. A tree with a Tree Preservation Order needs council consent before works are carried out. Works to trees in a conservation area need six weeks written notice to the council. Penalties for unauthorised works on protected trees can include unlimited fines, so this is worth confirming whatever stage your application is at.
You can get an indicative answer in a minute with our free checker at Is my tree protected?, which reads the national planning dataset. It is indicative only. Councils hold the definitive registers of protected trees, so confirm with your council before any work starts.
Our tree surveys are priced and delivered on their own: the findings are what the trees need, and the report is yours to take to any contractor. If work follows, we can also carry it out as an ARB Approved Contractor (AC2637), but nothing in the survey depends on that. We carry £1m professional indemnity insurance, we quote within one working day, and the price we quote is the price you pay.
If you are preparing an application in Preston, across Lancashire or anywhere in the North West and are not sure what the council will ask for, use the free scope check form or call the office on 07884 274693. We will tell you what you need, and just as readily what you do not.
