TREES AND E-GOVERNMENT

**NEWS** The Isle of Wight Council’s trees on-line has been cited as an example of Local Authority ‘best practice’ in research commissioned by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister.

The e-government initiative is part of the national Modernising Government agenda an aim of which is to ensure that all services which can be provided electronically are provided in this way by the end of 2005.

The Isle of Wight Council’s Tree Section along with support from the ICT department is at the forefront of the Council’s delivery of e-government services. Following the digitisation of the Tree Section records as part of the TPO Review project, it is now possible to see the extent of tree protection (under TPO legislation) over the whole Island. Each TPO has been given its own unique reference number in the following format TPO/1986/23 (ie. TPO/Year/Number). Please use this reference number format when searching for TPOs on-line.

If you want to find out if your trees are protected you can search the map for your address or, if you know the TPO’s reference number, by searching the records you can see a digital copy of it. The digitised TPOs are in PDF format and, once you have found a protected tree on the map, the TPO can be viewed by clicking on the ‘show TPO documents’ link.

However, the digital map only shows trees that are protected by Tree Preservation Orders. Trees can also be protected by planning conditions and by being within Conservation Areas.

Please contact trees@iow.gov.uk tel: 01983 823893 for definitive and up to date information on tree protection, including endorsed copies of TPOs.