Owners Corporation SP 75600 v Hsu [2011] NSWLEC 1235

Land and Environment Court New South Wales

Medium Neutral Citation: Owners Corporation SP 75600 v Hsu [2011] NSWLEC 1235 Hearing dates: 12 August 2011 Decision date: 12 August 2011 Jurisdiction: Class 2 Before: Pearson C Galwey AC Decision: Application upheld in part Catchwords: TREES (NEIGHBOURS); damage to property; risk of injury; tree pruning and removal ordered. Legislation Cited: Trees (Disputes Between Neighbours) Act 2006 Cases Cited: Barker v Kyriakides [2007] NSWLEC 292 Yang v Scerri [2007] NSWLEC 592 Category: Principal judgment Parties: Owners Corporation SP 75600 (Applicant)

Tien Chun Hsu (Respondent) Representation: Ms Pam McKiernan (Agent for the applicant)

Mr Kenneth Lin (Agent for the respondent) File Number(s): 20203 of 2011

Judgment

Introduction 1This is an application pursuant to Part 2 of the Trees (Disputes Between Neighbours) Act 2006 (the Act) by the Owners Corporation SP 75600 of a property in Baulkham Hills against the owner of trees growing on an adjoining property. 2The applicant seeks removal of one tree and pruning of two trees on the basis that they have caused damage and are likely to cause further damage, and pose a risk of injury. 3The respondent wishes to retain the trees, although stated he would "reluctantly allow" the removal of one tree and pruning of the others at the applicant's expense. 4The Tree Dispute Claim Details (Damage to Property or Injury to a Person) form accompanying the application provided details of damage to property (Questions 4-8), and likelihood of injury (Questions 9-13). Leave was given to the applicant to amend the application to specify in response to Question 1 of that form, that both damage to property and injury to any person were the basis for the application. 5We note that the numbering of the trees in the application is confusing with regard to their locations. On one plan they are numbered T2, T3 & T1 but are not accurately located. On another plan they are located accurately but are not numbered. For this reason we shall refer to the trees as Tree A, Tree B and Tree C, in order from the front (northwest) to the rear (southeast).