Honolulu Urban Forest Management Plan
As Principal of L. E. Smith Consulting at the time, Mr. Smith completed this project in 2003 and produced a Street Tree Management Plan for the City and County of Honolulu, Hawaii. The contents of this Plan include the following:
- Volume I: Analysis of the Existing Conditions— Urban Setting, Physiographic Conditions, Existing Street Tree Population (based on actual inventory data), Existing Policies, Regulations, Guidelines & Administration [Pertaining to the Urban Forest]
- Volume II – Street Tree Management Plan Recommendations
- Long Term Goals & Objectives
- Tree Protection Program
- Tree Removal & Replacement Program
- Street Tree Planting Program
- Street Tree Maintenance Plan
- Street Tree Five-Year Work Plan
- Volume III – Appendices – contains all the source material used to prepare this Plan and includes the street tree data, council district maps showing the data and locations of trees by species (includes vacant sites), national and local standards and best practices, and references.
While this plan can be viewed as a Master Plan, it should be used as a Management Plan with yearly metrics for all aspects of managing a street tree inventory – in this case in Honolulu. Fortunately, we had the benefit of having a recent GIS-based street tree inventory that had been completed while Mr. Smith was still the Western Region Municipal Manager for the Davey Resource Group, a division of Davey Tree Company. As a result of having this data in a GIS format, data analysis could be done for pretty much any combination of variables for which data had been collected.
With the overlay of other types of data such as demographic data and council district boundaries yearly goals for tree planting, pruning (including small tree training pruning), and removals & replacement could be targeted to the more disadvantaged communities where generally speaking there is a correlation between demographics, poor planting conditions (very narrow or non-existing parkways), and with a larger number of above ground and under-ground utility conflicts. In other words, we had data to target where the needs for each type of activity were greatest.
There are two (2) downloadable documents related to this project. The larger file contains 1) the full table of contents, table of figures, and list of all appendices; 2) executive summary of the Analysis of Existing Conditions; 3) the entire extent of Volume II – Street Tree Management Plan Recommendations: and 4) excerpts from Volume III: Appendices. The latter includes data maps of the street trees in each council district with data tables (Appendix C) and Appendix S – References. The smaller file contains the full TOC and executive summaries of Volume I – Analysis of Existing Conditions and Volume II – Street Tree Management Plan Recommendations
Honolulu Street Tree Management Plan Executive Summaries Honolulu Street Tree Management Plan