Topcat

Firstly the TPO needs to be confirmed within 6 months,otherwise it is not valid. Anyone can lodge an objection during that time.(From what you say it's going to be confirmed anyway.) Not saying who's right or wrong but the TO made a decision and you are stuck with it.It's now up to the client or his agent to decide how to deal with it. All trees must warrant a TPO and you would hope that whilst TO's might make quick, on the spot decisions they will use that 6 month period to asses their original decision.Some one like yourself may write in explaining they feel that the trees are infact dangerous and are a risk. TO comes back to you and says prove it and put that in an application like you would any other TPO'd tree. If you prove a need for work the LA will probably approve it. Remember that the TPO regs also allows for the removal of dangerous trees via the 5 day notice. No council (unless they got an injunction) can stop anyone from removing a tree.It's just they may well prosecute you if you were wrong in your diagnosis (spelling?) In 30 years I have never had a council go for an injuction,Why, because where you can prove faults within the tree that backs your argument for "dangerous" It is ney impossible for any one to prove a tree is Safe. Reduction may make a tree safer but is it now safe? If the Council did go for an injunction to stop felling and one was granted,your client could then ask the same judge to make the council accept liability. How could the council argue against this when they have just argued the safety of the tree? to my knowledge councils don't take on the liability of others knowingly. This then answers your question as to who would be liable if these trees now failed. Answer Your client and if your client sued, his agent could be found liable also.Put simply we are employed by clients to advise and deal with tree related problems.TO's are not here to advise individual tree owners (although most do).They are there to manage the overall treescape of an area and TPO regs are a tool they have at their disposal to help them. We are the ones that get paid (hopefully) to advise and manage clients trees. If we accept the remit and cheque we should be prepared to argue the case at all times to protect our clients. There are far to many that don't realise they are giving advice. If you look at this particular job. You are the ones on site working with the trees, you have the best and most up to date info on these trees. The TO comes to site,spends 30 mins and acts on what he see's. It's not his job to come back and start doing reports or do our job for us.It's up to the contractor to speak with the client and help them make a decision on the way forward. If your going to say " we can appeal or we can apply but it will take xx weeks". Please don't forget to mention " but in the mean time you will be liable should anything fail" unless we do this or that and by the way it will cost you ££'s more and can you sign here. I'm not a TO or a TO hugger..lol. Some are a pain and some are very good to work with.I bet they say the same about us at their get togethers. I do think TO's, consultants and contractors all have a part to play in managing the treescape.It's just a shame that sometimes we always don't seem to get a long to well.

There is always something in this job that needs some spanner work.That would get noticed on your CV and be a very good string on bow.Why not contact some local tree firms and offer some spanner work in exchange for a bit of tree work exp and a few ££'s to cover your fuel. You could find it worked for both and they may even help with the 10 wk costs.It would show your committed and anything to stand out from the crowd will help.Good luck

Stobart Biomass, collect 27.2 tons @ £8 per ton net £217.60. Thats the exact figures off our last invoice. Costs me £40 for local farmer to load it.They do self billing and pay into bank within 3 weeks..Job sorted. Contact Tel No 01768 593120

Dust on cars...how about this. A company was felling a tree next to a classroom.Parked chipper on a slope and start work.The chute vibrates sideways,been summer all the big windows were open and spray chips all over the people inside..lol. whoops. after a lot of shoe licking they decide to fell the butt which is at the top of slope. perfect felling cuts,butt it's the deck,rolls down the slope and through the £6k glass sliding doors.(apparently the doors didn't slide to easily when they went to tell someone.lol) Some how they still get work there. Ps..the dust sheets didn't quite work on this occassion.

Anything we take back to yard for firewood is in length's or rounds that at least 2 people can lift. Thought about buying a splitter that I could run off the mog,in the end went completly opposite and bought a 7 ton electric woodline off Richard at fuelwood.Had it a good 10 years and not one problem,split just about everything but bear in mind we only probably do 30/40 loads to customers and our own 2 fires. I have found that a lot of customers now want to keep firewood off the jobs so we ring their wood up and then hire them our spliiter. It's easy to transport,does the job and any women that can turn on a washer or telly to watch jeremy Kyle can use it. They don't have to pay for the gym and they can take all their daily frustration out on the wood at weekends giving you time to sit back with a tinny whilst trying to understand the rules of womens beach volly ball (damn olympics have finished).lol

We burn if it's a must especially big dead trees that are felled and shatter into a million bits on impact,great fun collecting for chipper.Only had a cpl of problems,on one site a dip stick from the council came out with a colour card and tried to match the colour of the smoke with one on the card.White smoke no problem if not affending anyone. Next time felled a poplar in a garden over a river.Got permission off waterways to burn in their field miles away from houses.Left a small fire at 6pm in the good hands of an old boy that lived nearby,at 6.30 gets acall from the fire officer.No probs but the guy we were working for rang them, cheers great guy..lol It seems common sense makes a big difference. watch the smoke and ring the fire bods in advance. One thing about fires before 6pm etc. Some Councils have a time stated in their tenancy agreements that fire's should not be started before. So you have to check when working in a council house garden or just knock a few quid off and get the tenant to burn it.

Just come across this debate,don't know how I missed it the first time. Having lived in York all my life and having worked for this uni in the passed I thought I might give some history. As I understand it the trees were originally topped back in the 70's. I think it was 1995/6 when we got the job to deadwood and make safe. We used a mewp (theres loads of room on the pavement) and had very little problems with traffic etc,think we did it over 2 days. Before we quoted I climbed a cpl to have a look around and see what was up there. Just about every tree had cavities some badly decayed with some seriously dangerous limbs. It be came apparent that this was just what some within the uni wanted to hear. So we have to fell them then. I came up with a plan. Fell the odd really bad tree, Take out the odd dangerous limb, reduce the sail by way of light reduction and dead wood, plant a new avenue of Limes further back within the grounds and over the years keep taking out the worse trees. The uni did not like the costs but in the end decided to go down that route.In comes the local newly qualified TO with the auger in hand ready to start testing the trees 1m from ground level,"this will tell us if any tree needs felling Mr treeman" .First tree snap, no more auger. Would you like to use my new shinny "Arborsonic decay detector" madame tree officer or how about climb the ladder or go up in the mewp and have a look. In the end she agreed with everything except the light reduction. It became apparent that the council owned another line of Limes on the other side of the road.Don't know how I missed them and at this moment in time the council did not have funds to do the same work to their trees. Therefore the uni reductions would spoil the avenue. The Uni agreed and hence our spec became,deadwood and fell 1 tree. I never saw the pics that were put up on this site but I suppose the first pic probably showed the trees as we had left them some 16 yrs earlier. To my knowledge the trees have not been worked on since and there as been no major failures there was always a bit of dead wood dropping but that was usually after a decent wind. So I guess I picked the right limbs to remove (more luck than management, there was that many). I think the job cost about £1500 back then plus what ever it cost them to plant the new ave that there gardeners put in. So all in all less than £100 a year for all them trees not bad I suppose. York survives on tourist's and students (try buying a stihl in town.lol) and the uni's seem to get away with anything these days. It was no suprise when I saw what they have now done.In my opinion the contractor won't have had a lot of say in the spec if there is any blame it should be the consultant, LPA and client that agreed the work. I do know of the contractor who did the work,they are not from York but do most if not all of the work for that Uni. This job has been discussed with a good few contractors from York and I can't find one that saw the spec or priced it (not to say there is'nt one). How much do you guys reckon for the work? a good few grand and how many can say they would not have done it, for the price to that spec, if they had been offered it. I know I would have. Anyway its done now,still think they could have done a light reduction although some one had a closer look than us and it got passed. Given the extent of the spec and the fact there is a new ave planted maybe they should have just felled the lot. PSt.The Castle is on the opposite side of York,It's the bar walls you were thinking of..lol

If a tree is judged to be that dangerous that it requires a 5 day notice when I see it.I always ring the council tell them what I see and tell them it's comming down ASAP.That usually means that afternoon or the following day. I work on the principle of if it's not going to be safe in 5 days it ain't safe today. We are supposed to be the experts and must look after the clients interests. Once you have id the iminent danger,told the client,got the job,told the council etc, who's liable. The council might say "but that is not the system" but I bet they would also soon turn around and say,"well the regs are there for you to deal with dangerous trees, so don't start blaming us that it collapsed last night while you were waiting for us to get back to you." Always make sure you are spot on with your decision to fell and always get before and after pics.

Lad who used to work as a groundie for me,set his self up last year. First thing he bought was a chainsaw from BQ at £80. We all took the lash out of him. He's taken it back a couple of times (when chain was knackered and slack) and they have given him a new one,more balls than me hehe. He bought a second hand chipper about 3 weks ago so making some ££'s and to top it all he got me out of the mire back in June when I got all my saws knicked. Sod it I'm of to buy one might change my luck.lol

on same topic. If anyone has had any sthil machines knicked in the local area, York police have a few they have lifted in a recent raid. I went down on Friday to have a look at a blower and strimmer. Both looked brand new no serial no's and alas not mine. Don't know what others they had, they would not say.

It's not a licence.It's a cert of competence and no one has to have one. Most employers,contract and site managers won't let you work unless you have one. I have a NPTC for 360 digger but can't get work on a building site unless I also have a CPCS. That said it's the first thing the HSE will ask for if they hear about an accident with a chainsaw. They work on, because you can get them it may have been prevented had you had one. Best just ring the HSE and mention no PTO gaurd that will get them running to site..lol

I got all my certs of comp's back in the early 90's when I was a Fastco instructor and Nptc assesor and they are all still in paper form with the old numbers.ie 10.16.20.21.22. I work most days and feel a lot more confident with a saw now than what I was back then. At present the certs are for life and any old units can be cross checked with the up to date ones. When I last spoke to the NPTC they said that for a small fee they will issue me with a new plastic card with all my old units converted to new but they were not bothered either way. If you have lost your old certs then they will charge £30 extra to search their data base. By the sounds of things it's the guy at the council who needs a refresher course

Your welcome to come down to ours and take all the crappy narly bits,we will always have a ton load. Just see us right with a few beer vouchers.

employer and employee = Master and servant, different matter if you are a subby. I would check the law.You should not be held responsible for actions you undertake as a direct instructio byour employer. Unless you go and shoot some one of course lol