Trees and Pavements—are They Compatible?

Summary Research into the interaction of tree roots and the conditions beneath our pavements, particularly soil materials and compaction, has been carried out for Transport for London. The programme included work to allow pavement specifications to be interpreted in terms familiar to arboriculturists, work to express the requirements of trees in terms familiar to highway engineers, work to examine the performance of roots in compacted substrates including soils and construction materials, and work to establish how much water a mature tree requires from the root zone. The objective of this work, carried out between 1999 and 2002, was to contribute to new planting:paving systems which allow trees of large stature to flourish in our urban centres. This paper describes the work and the results achieved, updating an earlier paper presented in 2000 (BLUNT, 2001).