Arboriculture & Urban Forestry 41(4): July 2015 label Four categories of episodes were used to urban tree disservices in this study: A. ‘Tree incident’: when the item reported an unexpected episode (or the effect of an unidentified cause), such as a branch falling down. B. ‘Natural growth’: when the problem reported concerned vegetation being, for example, too high or too wide. C. ‘Illness on tree’: when reports concerned fungus on trees or leaves being visually affected by some kind of insect or disease. D. ‘Human misconduct’: when the item referred to problems like vandalism or litter. The categories were based on how the person reporting perceived the episode. Obviously, many tree incidents could have been caused by illness, human misconduct, or even natural growth. But this interpretation did not distinguish between episodes that had actually happened and episodes that were reported as likely (e.g., “a branch might fall down”). Each item classified as an episode according to this criteria was also classified as a type or sometimes several type(s) of disservice. This sub- sequent classification required varying degrees of interpretation, as the complaint records were not made with this kind of research aim in mind. For example, an item such as “branches hanging out on the sidewalk” was classified under the category ‘Environmental problems/hazards’; subcat- egory ‘Obstructing traffic on roads and sidewalks’, even though the problem was not explicitly stated. RESULTS The most common complaint/comment overall, accounting for 33% of all requests, were directed toward municipal arborists. When only analyzing the urban tree disservice, the most common type of episode was ‘Natural growth’, accounting for Causes of complaint/comment Tree incident Natural growth Illness on tree Human misconduct Comment/request Total number No. of items (% of total) 1,147 1,808 634 481 2,049 6,119 (19%) (30%) (10%) (8%) (33%) (100%) 189 30% of requests. The least common was ‘Human misconduct’, which accounted for 8% (Table 1). The most frequent urban tree disservice on record concerned ‘Environmental problems/ hazards’ (Table 2). There were no recorded items on either ‘Economic problems/hazards’ or ‘Costs and expenditure’. The records on ‘Social problems/ hazards’ were solely restricted to the subcategory ‘Causing fear of crime’. There were no records on ‘Causing fear of diseases/insects/ other animals’ in trees, forests, and associated environments. On the other hand, there were some records of related actual (not-feared) dis- services within the category ‘Health problems/ hazards’; i.e., the subcategories ‘Increasing allergy attacks by plant pollens’ (9 items), ‘Increasing attack by associated insects and other animals’ (63 items), and ‘Risk of trees falling and causing personal injury’ (191 items). Only two items concerned drainage problems caused by trees, an otherwise well-known problem. DISCUSSION The municipal records of complaints/comments received in Stockholm, Göteborg, and Malmö con- tained items that provided evidence of several types of perceived disservices. This pilot study confirmed that such data can help generate knowledge on how the public perceives urban ecosystem disservices. There were many different causes for the disser- vices reported (Table 1). The fact that trees grow, become large, and as a consequence, sometimes come into conflict with urban infrastructure is known, and future conflicts can be avoided by planners. Other types, such as illnesses and incidents are known to happen, but can be difficult to prevent. The last type of cause, ‘Human misconduct’, is not inherent to ecosystems, but rather occurs in an ecosystem set- ting. Thus it can be questioned whether this should be regarded as a perceived ecosystem disservice at Table 1. Categories of episodes: recorded causes of perceived problems or annoyances related to trees in the Swedish cities of Göteborg, Malmö, and Stockholm. Example of item Two windthrown trees are blocking a footpath Sidewalk overgrown Suspected Dutch elm disease on tree Graffiti on tree Cost of planting trees? ©2015 International Society of Arboriculture
July 2015
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