"Minimizing Your Footprint, Enhancing Your Performance"
All trees pose some level of risk to nearby people, structures and utilities. Typically, this risk is outweighed by the environmental, social, and economic benefits that that trees provide. As trees age or become weakened by factors such as disease, pests, and structural deformities the balance may shift, however, requiring tree owners and managers to decide what level of risk is acceptable and what modifications are needed. Being able to identify the signs and symptoms associated with various defects such as decayed wood, cracks, root problems, weak branch unions, poor tree architecture, and dead tops or branches is necessary to pinpoint structures susceptible to failure.
Tree risk assessment is the systematic process used to identify, analyze, and evaluate tree risk. Understating this systematic process allows a determination to be made on the likelihood of whole or partial tree failure, the consequences of such failure, and the potential targets affected.
At EC Consulting, our arborists understand the nuances of tree health, structure and physiology and are trained on the International Society of Arboriculture (ISA) standards and procedures for Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3 tree risk assessment. We offer training that details various situations where each level of risk assessment is appropriate. From there, we teach how to identify structural defects susceptible to failure as well as possible mitigation techniques for a variety of conditions and situations. Our training outlines the ISA’s Best Management Practices (BMP) for systematic tree risk assessment. We go through the ISA recommended process for qualitative tree risk assessment which involves using ratings of the likelihood and consequences of an event to determine a risk level and evaluate the level of risk against qualitative criteria.
Using the ISA’s risk assessment matrix gives urban forest mangers a standardized system that uses the likelihood of failure and the likelihood of that failure impacting a target to determine the severity of the potential consequence of failure. Using this systematic process includes setting a threshold of acceptable risk which allows you to make a justifiable decision on when action needs to be taken. This can help protect municipalities and property owners from liability should tree failure occur.
Our tree risk assessment training includes a field component which brings you outside to practice the tree risk assessment process and discuss appropriate mitigation solutions for various conditions. Our course is also accredited by the ISA to provide you with CEU’s. Contact us to schedule a training course that sets you up to conduct your own informed and methodical tree risk assessment.
