Local residents have expressed shock and outrage, after two Individuals today cut down a tree located on open land in middle of a Penrith Housing estate in what could be Penriths own Sycamore Gap incident.
A poster mysteriously appeared recently that was screwed into the now chopped down tree that said:
“To whoever it may concern I hereby give persons reading this notice. notification of our intention to have this tree felled. If ANY person should express their concern or object to the felling of this tree please notify me by either phone or text detailing your concerns and reasons as to why you object to the tree being felled. It is intended for the work to be carried out in early December 2023.”
The notice also contained a mobile number.
A concerned member of the public contacted us last night in the hope of raising awareness locally to saving the tree from what has been called by one nearby resident today “an act of environmental vandalism.” Adding “how can someone just decide to chop down a healthy tree when they don’t own it and it’s in a public area.”
By early Thursday afternoon in the heavy rain the tree had been reduced to a pile of logs and a stump left in the ground.
The pair felling the tree told our reporter who confirneted them over the felling of the tree, they had felled the tree for logs and had tried all reasonably efforts to trace an owner of the land and tree including contacting Westmorland and Furness Council, Lowther Estates and even the Crown estate but in their view the land the tree was on had no owner, so they had chosen to chop it down.
They also claimed that they had placed the notice, and no one raise any objections to the felling of the tree.
We have spoken with Westmorland and Furness Council this afternoon who are now investigating if the tree and land belongs to them an if the tree was covered by a tree preservation order like other trees on the same piece of land.
The tree was located on an area of open green space that has a public footpath running between Thirlmere Park, Porthouse road, Clifford Road and Huntley Court.
Separate to today's incident, Westmorland and Furness Council are consulting on the felling of a Mature Oak tree covered by a tree preservation order on the same stretch.
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