Council for the chop

According to the weather forecast, springtime may be starting in Stoke on Friday. What better time, then, than this weekend for you to spring outside with the hedge clippers and trim back your overgrown hedge or tree? "Or else", says the city Council...

Council: 'Cut your overgrown trees and hedges back NOW!' (or we will bill you for doing the work) — Stoke Sentinel.

"Council bosses are targeting overhanging trees and bushes blocking pavements - and will bill anyone who fails to cut them back. The council's highway asset and group coordination team will now take over the enforcement.

In a report, public rights of way officer Paul Pearce said: “Failure to comply with the notice allows the highway authority to take any necessary action to remove the vegetation and then recover any reasonable costs incurred by so doing.”

Community leaders have welcomed the crackdown. Reg Edwards, secretary of Hartshill and Harpfields Residents’ Association, said: “If bushes and trees are overhanging across a pavement then people have to step into the road. It reduces the width of the pavement and it can be difficult to appreciate the scale of the overhang at times until you walk into it and it can be quite painful.”"

The Sentinel and the Residents’ Assoc. both use the word "pavements", which might mislead a little. Our "public rights of way" are not just on the roadsides, but are all paths, and the city has abundant off-road paths and tracks, and 'ways around the back' known only to locals. These also need trimming, as there are plenty of people in Stoke who walk because they don't have cars — 45% (nearly half) of all households in Stoke-on-Trent don't have access to a car.