Tree Removal Permits in Austin and Los Angeles

Whether a tree needs a permit to come down depends on the city. Austin goes by size: on a residential lot, a tree 19 inches or more across is protected and needs a permit to remove, and one of 24 inches or more of ten listed species is a heritage tree that, outside an emergency, comes down only with a variance. Los Angeles goes by species: six native trees and shrubs are protected from 4 inches across, and removing or pruning any tree in the street takes a permit.

Austin: protected and heritage trees

Austin’s Land Development Code calls a tree with a diameter of 19 inches or more, measured 4½ feet above natural grade, a protected tree, and except in the emergency described below, no one may remove one without a permit from the city. A heritage tree is 24 inches or more and one of ten species: Texas ash, bald cypress, American elm, cedar elm, Texas madrone, bigtooth maple, any oak, pecan, Arizona walnut and eastern black walnut. The city’s rules may add species to that list but not take them off. Removing a heritage tree takes a permit that the city issues only with an approved variance, with the same emergency exception, and the rule reaches trees on public as well as private property.

Development Services says trees under 19 inches are not regulated on residential property, though the work may need other permits. For a regulated tree it wants a Tree Ordinance Review Application to remove the tree, to prune 25 percent or more of its canopy, or to start work that may impact the tree or disturb its critical root zone.

Heritage tree variances

The director may grant an administrative variance, on the city arborist’s recommendation, for a heritage tree that is dead, that is an imminent hazard to life or property which cannot reasonably be mitigated without removing it, or that is diseased where restoring it to sound condition is not practicable or the disease may spread to other trees and endanger their health. That variance needs no application fee and no mitigation.

For a heritage tree with no stem of 30 inches or more, the director may also grant one on the arborist’s recommendation, if the tree meets the approval criteria in section 25-8-624(A), the owner has applied for and been denied relief under another code provision that would let the tree stay, and the need to remove it does not come from the way the owner chose to develop the property, unless removing it results in a design that gets the most ecological, historic and cultural value from the trees on the site. That variance requires mitigation. The code also provides a variance from the Land Use Commission, in section 25-8-643. This guide does not cover the approval criteria or the commission’s variance; for a heritage tree with a stem of 30 inches or more, or any case the administrative variance does not reach, ask Development Services.

Measuring a tree

Austin measures the trunk 4½ feet above the ground: wrap a flexible tape around it and divide the circumference by 3.14 for the diameter. On a slope, measure from the high side, and where the trunk swells at that height, measure above or below the swelling. For a tree with several stems, take the largest stem and add half of each of the others, so stems of 18 and 16 inches count as 26. Los Angeles counts a tree’s cumulative diameter at 4½ feet above the ground.

What counts as removal

Neither city limits the rule to cutting a tree down. Austin counts any act that causes, or may reasonably be expected to cause, a tree to die, including uprooting, severing the main trunk, damaging the roots and excessive pruning. In a regulated tree’s critical root zone, Development Services allows no impact within the inner quarter, no cut or fill of more than 4 inches within the inner half, and wants half the ground of the whole zone left undisturbed. Los Angeles counts any act that will cause a protected tree or shrub to die, including damage to its roots or any other part by fire, toxic substances or machinery, and changing the natural grade of the drip line area around its trunk by digging or filling.

Los Angeles: protected native trees and shrubs

Los Angeles protects six Southern California natives from 4 inches of cumulative diameter, measured 4½ feet above the ground: any oak native to California except the scrub oak, including the valley oak and the California live oak; the Southern California black walnut; the western sycamore; the California bay; and two shrubs, the Mexican elderberry and the toyon. Trees and shrubs grown or held for sale by a licensed nursery, or planted as part of a planting program, are not covered. Moving or removing a protected one takes a permit from the Board of Public Works. The exception is where the Board is satisfied that the removal was approved by the Advisory Agency under the subdivision rules, is permissible under a planning determination that is final and still in effect, or is required to carry out a building permit still in effect.

The Board may grant the permit where the removal will not cause irreversible soil erosion that cannot be mitigated and the tree either keeps the property from reasonable development, has declined past economical restoration, or is in danger of falling from an irreversible condition. A tree designated a Historical Monument, or designated as part of a Historic Preservation Overlay Zone, can go only on that last ground. The Board may require at least four protected specimens planted on the same property for each one removed, each a 15-gallon tree or larger, at least 1 inch across a foot above its base and at least seven feet tall, and where the replacement concerns more than two protected trees or shrubs, the permit goes to a full public hearing.

Street trees

In Los Angeles no one may plant, remove, cut, prune or otherwise injure a tree in a street without a permit from the Board of Public Works. The owner of a lot in a residential zone may remove the shrubs and plants in the parkway in front of it, but not the trees, and replace them with landscaping without a permit, if the work follows the Board’s Residential Parkway Landscaping Guidelines. As a condition of a removal permit, the Board may require a replacement tree of the type and size the permit specifies, planted within 40 days of the permit’s issue. StreetsLA’s Urban Forestry Division inspects the site before it issues or denies a removal permit, and a request to remove three or more trees goes to the Board. In Austin, maintaining, removing or damaging a tree on public property takes the urban forester’s approval, and the city code calls a tree with at least two-thirds of its trunk diameter on public property a public tree. For a removal, the urban forester may require a replacement tree or a payment equal to a replacement’s value.

Damaged and dangerous trees

Austin lets anyone remove a damaged protected tree that is an imminent hazard to life or property without a permit, and a damaged heritage tree in the same state without a variance, if it comes down within seven days of the damage; the city may extend that deadline after widespread storm damage. On public property, a tree or limb that has fallen, or is in imminent danger of falling, may be removed without the urban forester’s approval where that creates a hazardous or dangerous condition. In Los Angeles, a protected tree in danger of falling from an irreversible condition is one of the grounds for the Board’s permit rather than an exception to it.

With a building project

In Austin, a regulated tree on a lot that is getting a building permit is reviewed with that permit; work that needs no other permit goes in as a standalone Tree Ordinance Review Application. In Los Angeles, the Board exempts a removal from its permit when it is satisfied that a building permit still in effect requires the removal. A new garage, ADU or pool near a regulated or protected tree brings these rules in with its building permit.