Guides · Dover Hedges

Section 211 notice for Dover conservation areas: the 6-week rule and 75 mm threshold

Dover District Council has designated 57 conservation areas across the district, from Dover Town Centre (appraisal adopted 1988) and Buckland through to St Margaret's-at-Cliffe, Kingsdown and Sandwich. If your property is inside one of them, section 211 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 changes what you can do to trees on your land.

Section 211 is trees-only

This is the most common misunderstanding. Section 211 does not cover hedge species, it covers trees. That means:

• A privet, laurel, leylandii, beech, hornbeam or yew hedge that you trim to hedge shape once or twice a year is exempt from s.211. Cut it whenever the nesting window allows.
• Any tree in a CA with a trunk diameter over 75 mm at 1.5 m above ground level (chest height) is caught. That includes a hedgerow tree, a hedge that has been let go long enough that individual stems now count as trees, and any standalone tree.
• The status of the tree does not depend on species. A 76 mm holly stem in a CA is caught. A 5 m unmanaged leylandii with a 100 mm base in a CA is caught.

The 6-week written notice

If your work catches s.211, you must give DDC six weeks' written notice before you start. In practice you send a written notice, DDC has six weeks to respond, and if they do not object (or issue a TPO to protect the tree instead) you can proceed. If they issue a TPO, that supersedes and you now need TPO consent, which is a different process.

DDC's tree officer usually gives a straight yes-or-no response inside the six weeks. Getting one back in three weeks is common if the work is uncontroversial.

Penalties if you do not notify

Under s.210 TCPA 1990 (which covers unauthorised work on TPO or CA trees), fines are up to £20,000 on summary conviction and unlimited on indictment for wilful destruction. Level 4 (currently £2,500) for lesser breaches. Courts factor in any financial gain to the offender and can order replacement planting. Even a mildly aggravating factor (loss of a mature amenity tree, a visible cliff-face impact) can push a case up to the Crown Court.

What we file, and when

For any Dover job inside a CA, we walk the boundary before we quote. If any stem measures over 75 mm at 1.5 m we file the s.211 notice on your behalf as part of the quote. That is included, not extra. We attach photos, a location plan and the proposed work in plain terms. Most of these come back consented inside four weeks, so it does not usually delay the job much.

Where the CA boundaries sit

DDC publishes the CA maps on their planning portal. The main ones in the Dover area are:

• Dover Town Centre (appraisal 1988; covers most of Market Square, Castle Hill flank, Snargate, King Street)
• Buckland Estate
• St Margaret's-at-Cliffe (village core plus part of St Margaret's Bay)
• Kingsdown
• Sandwich (extensive; multi-part)
• Alkham

If you are not sure which CA your address is in, or whether you are inside one, DDC's planning portal has an interactive map. We check it at quote stage as a matter of course.

What you can still do without s.211

Everything a hedge normally needs. Twice-yearly formal cutting, keeping the hedge at its current height, taking side-growth back to the boundary line, cutting neighbour-overhanging branches back to your boundary. The s.211 threshold only applies once a stem is over 75 mm at 1.5 m, and only for trees, not for hedges cut to hedge shape.

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