Video shows large tree toppling inches away from houses on Milton Keynes estate

A rotten tree identified a problem 11 months ago has crashed to the ground perilously close to residents' homes.
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The tree was captured on one resident CCTV camera when it fell, crashing onto his driveway in Redhouse Park, just outside Newport Pagnell.

Minutes previously, his wife had been grouting the path to the front door, exactly where the tree landed.

The willow, which stood at the corner of Top Fox Way and Hopcrofts Meadows, had been the subject of a survey ordered by the company that manages the estate, Nationspaces, in September last year.

The tree landed in the  resident's drivewayThe tree landed in the  resident's driveway
The tree landed in the resident's driveway

Residents say the survey showed it was rotten and needed to be felled within three months.

"However, no work was carried out and recently the tree fell down, narrowly missing my property," said the householder.

He pays Nationspaces £180 a year as his contribution towards the estate management.

He said: "Having contacted Nationspaces, they are trying to blame insufficient funds and Covid-19 for delay in undertaking work. But the survey was carried out a long time before this virus was identified.

"Households pay a significant amount of money to Nationspaces and should therefore expect them to undertake such work within the required time."

We have a neighbour whose vehicle sustained a broken front windscreen to car as a result of a falling branch. It was very fortunate that nobody was injured."

The Citizen contact Nationspaces for a comment. A spokesman said: "We have already responded to the complainant directly and apologised for any distress caused by this event."

He added: "Regular surveys are carried out on this estate, along with the works being commissioned and carried out. This development has substantial areas of trees within its boundaries and tree works are carried out annually in response to the reports received.

"The report was carried out on the 30th September 2019 and not received by us until the 10th October 2019. The works identified on the report were substantially more significant than those identified on the previous survey. The costs had increased from around £2500 to over £12,000. We therefore had to carry out due diligence checks to verify the difference in cost as we are accountable for the service charge spend to the estate residents.

"This dialogue took some weeks to satisfy the enquiries that had arisen from the report. In fact, there were insufficient funds available to carry out the full scope of works at that time collected from the residents. These funds had built up to the required level in early 2020.

Contractors were instructed in early 2020 to carry out the full survey works. They commenced works in February 2020 on a different area within the same development with plans to carry out more works as their schedule allowed. Unfortunately, the lockdown due to coronavirus stopped these works being completed and they had returned to site and were completing the survey requirements before this limb failed and fell to the ground."

The spokesman added: "The protection of the residents is of paramount importance to us and we are sorry for the fact this tree limb fell causing distress to the resident."

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