Our principles

These principles guide where we work. This is on public and private land across urban, urban fringe, and rural locations in Cheshire and Merseyside. Our work is guided by our “right tree, right place, right reason” area-specific principles.

16. Right tree, right place, right reason – area-specific principles
    1. Use the area-specific principles, and their associated long term tree cover ambitions, to guide what our longer-term 30% tree cover ambition might look like across our area. They are not binding targets for each area, but they do help to guide our work. These area-specific principles are displayed in the map below, in our Tree Atlas, and in a downloadable pdf. They:
       • Use landscape character as their basis.
       • Build on work from the original 1994 Mersey Forest Plan and subsequent development with our local authority partners.
       • Take into account constraints to new trees and woodland, such as peatland, other habitats, high quality agricultural land, and urban areas.
    2. Consider constraints for trees and woods, as part of any establishment and management.
       • Constraints have been built into our area-specific principles, and their associated long term tree cover ambitions.
       • Further to this our team considers a full range of constraints for each potential establishment or management site. Some of these constraints are included in our Tree Atlas, but we consider a wider range including location of utilities, and using data that we are not licensed to display on the Tree Atlas.
       • In some instances, a constraint will mean that trees and woodlands are not appropriate at a given location. In many, the constraint will influence the nature of the trees and woodlands that are appropriate.
    3. Consider any needs for trees and woods, as part of any establishment and management.
       • This can inform the nature of trees and woodland, and their management, as appropriate for each location.
       • Some needs mapping has been included in our Tree Atlas, but it is not an exhaustive list.

17. Cheshire and Merseyside
    1. Work across Cheshire and Merseyside to establish, look after, and nurture a culture of trees, woods, and other habitats, for the many benefits they bring to people, nature, and climate. We cover the local authorities of Cheshire East, Cheshire West and Chester, Halton, Knowsley, Liverpool, Sefton, St Helens, and Wirral. Warrington is also within the boundary of The Mersey Forest. Although Warrington Borough Council are no longer in The Mersey Forest Partnership, we still support some work in this area.
    2. Support work within a ten mile radius of our boundary if there is a specific rationale for it. In the majority of cases we focus our work within our boundary.
    3. Take opportunities to deliver at scale, whilst prioritising areas of greatest need for people, nature and climate. Prioritise using the latest evidence and mapping.
       
       Priorities for people include areas with:
       • Low Tree Equity Scores. This identifies urban neighbourhoods with a combination of low tree cover and income, health, employment, age, heat, and air pollution disparities.
       • Worse scores using the 3+30+300 metric. This is especially useful in urban areas. It identifies areas where houses have views of fewer than 3 trees, are in neighbourhoods / wards with lower tree cover, and are at greater distances to accessible green spaces.
       • Worse scores on the index of multiple deprivation. This shows relative measures of deprivation based on income, employment, education, skills and training, health and disability, crime, barriers to housing and services, and living environment.
       • Disparities in mental and physical health and well-being.
       • Schools, and particularly those in areas with highest levels of inequity.
       • Poor air quality, water quality, or in need of noise regulation.

       
       Priorities for nature include:

       • Local Nature Recovery Strategy opportunity areas, and mapped measures and actions relating to trees, woods and hedgerows.
       • Using the principles of “more, bigger, better, and joined”.

       
       Priorities for climate include:

       • Urban area where cooling will be most important, such as those classed as heat vulnerable neighbourhoods.
       • Areas upstream of flooding where natural flood management is important.

18. Urban, urban fringe and rural areas
    1. Deliver across urban, urban fringe, and rural areas. The nature of this delivery will vary greatly, with different opportunities and challenges. It will require us to:
       • Work with varying landowners, partners, and communities (as set out in the “Who principles”).
       • Access different funding streams.
       • Establish trees and woods in both soft and hard landscapes.
       • Deliver small to large scale schemes.
    2. Embrace the challenges of delivering in urban areas, as action here is essential to bring the most benefits for people.
       • There will be more hard landscape and retrofitting into existing urban areas, which is more expensive and challenging.
       • Plant individual trees, groups of trees and small woodlands on appropriate and available urban areas, settlements and employment sites. This includes school grounds, parks and open spaces, streets, highway verges, and transport routes, social housing, residential areas, in the grounds of large institutions, industrial grounds, vacant and derelict land, town centres, and neighbourhood centres. Even very small groups of trees can be important for giving a sense of immersion in nature, especially for children and young people.
       • Creating green corridors to connect urban to rural areas can improve connectivity for and with nature.
       • Work with partners to ensure trees are a key part of any new development, regeneration, and restructuring of urban areas (see principle 12.3 in “Strategy and policy”).
       • Work with partners to ensure that trees can be an effective and safe part of street scenes and highways.
       • Promote the importance of existing irreplaceable and mature trees. Work with partners to ensure that any trees lost are replaced, and to develop appropriate replacement ratios. Explore any empty tree pits, with a view to replanting them if feasible.
       • Safety is an important consideration, especially in urban areas where it can be built into the forest’s design.
    3. Deliver in urban fringe and rural locations, as action here can be at a scale needed to face the climate and nature crises.
       • Much of The Mersey Forest could be considered to be urban fringe. Nowhere is more than 9km from a city, town or village.
       • In these areas, the challenge is to integrate trees and woods into agricultural landscapes, supporting farming businesses and food security, whilst at the same time, seeking locations to accommodate larger scale woodlands. Engaging, advising and supporting farmers to integrate trees into their farms in a range of ways, including agroforestry systems, wood pasture and parkland, orchards, hedgerows and hedgerow trees, shelterbelts, and copses and woodlands on marginal or lower quality land.
       • Ensure that tree and woodland establishment and care is not at the expense of other existing habitats, with careful consideration given to areas prioritised for other habitats including peatlands and areas identified in Local Nature Recovery Strategies.
       • Urban fringe and rural trees and woods can help screen settlements, roads, and built development, provide recreation opportunities, and provide Natural Flood Management solutions upstream of areas at risk of flooding, whilst helping to tackle the climate and nature crises.

19. Public and private land
    1. Establish and manage trees and woods on both public and private land.
    2. Work alongside public and private landowners to support their differing objectives for trees and woodlands, whilst bringing wider benefits for people, nature, and climate.
20. Call for locations
    1. Encourage people to use our Tree Atlas to suggest locations where they would like to see more trees and woods. This includes local community groups, tree groups, schools and young people, town and parish councils, and landowners.
    2. Follow up on suggested locations to see if there is potential to establish trees and woods there or nearby and, if possible, work with the people who suggested it to make it happen. Not every location will be suitable due to a range of factors, including land ownership, constraints to trees and woods, and available funding. There will also be a time delay between any suggestion and getting trees in the ground. Hopefully over time we can demonstrate how people’s suggestions can lead to action.