Code Amendment ID: 10023 Tree Protection and Planting

The Tree Protection and Planting Code Amendment seeks to preserve and enhance South Australia’s tree canopy by updating tree protection policies, promoting design innovation to retain large trees, reviewing assessment pathways and policies for tree removal in certain cases, and extending both the Regulated and Significant Tree Overlay and the Urban Tree Canopy Overlay to cover more parts of South Australia.

Subject to investigations, the Code Amendment is anticipated to propose the following policy and spatial amendments, in response to requests from the government:

• Review policies in the Regulated and Significant Tree Overlay guiding the assessment of tree-damaging activity, in order to consider a regulated/significant tree’s contribution to urban tree canopy (at present, this Overlay does not specifically mention tree canopy).

• Review and update existing Code policies to provide design innovations and incentives that can be used to retain large trees when undertaking new development. For example, investigate whether reduced site areas/setbacks are appropriate for a residential infill development that retains mature trees, in order to achieve appropriate clearance from trees by providing a flexible assessment against policies in other areas. In effect, this flexible policy should incentivise the retention of trees on development sites while still providing for the same development yield.

• Require tree planting/retention when new houses are built in greenfield areas by expanding the spatial application of the Urban Tree Canopy Overlay to master-planned areas.

• Provide protection for greater number of large, mature trees, and require tree planting/retention with new homes, by expanding the spatial application of the Regulated and Significant Tree Overlay and Urban Tree Canopy Overlay to townships in Greater Adelaide.

• Investigate the appropriate assessment pathway/policies for the removal of a regulated/significant tree in proximity of an existing dwelling or in-ground swimming pool.

• Investigate a streamlined assessment pathway for tree-damaging activity where tree replanting will occur in accordance with a Tree Planting Strategy developed by the South Australian Housing Trust.