A DEVELOPER wants to cut down a prominent row of trees at the entrance to Christchurch borough.

The trees, mostly Monterey pines with a scattering of cypress, oak and hawthorn, line the A35 Lyndhurst Road as it runs past the Hoburne Farm Estate.

Hoburne Developments is building houses on the site, and plans to seek change of use permission in future to incorporate the land with the trees into their gardens.

Hence, the company is seeking permission to chop down 62 of the supposedly maintenance heavy pine trees, retaining just 16, as well as planting 56 new trees – a variety of hawthorn, hazel, rowan and other largely deciduous plants, most much smaller than the pines.

The developer's tree report from consultancy firm Treecall states that the Monterey pines are "likely to be around 120 years of age" and "in the final phase of their safe useful lifespan".

A second row of Monterey cypresses is judged as being "in poor condition" and not worthy of retention. The report claims they will "continue to be a nuisance to adjacent residents as their crowns thin out and they shed further small branches onto the boundary fence and into the rear gardens".

While a limited cull, leaving the pines in place, is initially proposed, Treecall claims the trees will require "a high level of ongoing management input for a number of years to come", and will "ultimately need to be felled".

Removing all the pines as well as the cypresses and some others will "allow for extensive replacement planting, to include both large canopy species and understorey species".

The report was written by arboricultural consultant Andrew Cleaves, who was previously part of the development management team at Bournemouth council before joining Treecall in 2015.

Mr Cleaves concludes: "There is no avoiding the fact that the loss to amenity from the removal of the Monterey pines will be significant in the short term.

"However, the long-term benefits to amenity, canopy cover and wildlife resulting from the proposed felling and replacement planting outweigh this short-term loss and cannot be achieved with a continued ad-hoc approach to management of the trees."