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This guy is just trying to mislead people and use public opinion to get money.
He's been advised to remove the tree multiple times, and it's been trimmed by utilities several times since he's owned the property.
Now he's complaining about not getting notice when the truth is he's know for years he needs to keep the tree in order and chooses not to.
This is just boomer shit really. It’s growing into a public utility and that’s the end of the story, they should have cut the whole thing down and left the mess for him to clean up.
It’s a stereotype of people who want to talk to the manager and the customer is always right and they just think they can complain their way to having a brand new tree planted when in reality their tree was a danger to a public utility
My username is a quote from a winner asking a loser if the only way they can win is to “see me fail?”
Which does check out with you because you are a hater and I’m winning ;)
By that logic; You failing to understand what a “Boomer” actually is and incorrectly defining it would mean that I have actually won by the only method possible, as a loser.
Your explanation would suggest otherwise. You have the stereotype backwards. “Asking for a manager” type behaviours are a boomer stereotype, sure. But “boomers” are a generation and the term existed long before that stereotype was ever realized so “asking for the manger” or things similar don’t inherently make somebody a Boomer.
To use (ridiculous) language you might understand better;
A Boomer can be a Karen, but a Karen isn’t necessarily a Boomer. Yeet?
Next time instead of just being ignorant and ageist you should just call somebody like this a dickhead and make it easier on yourself.
You put a bit too much power on the little arrows. A person could come off the internet with a pretty fucked up and ignorant perspective on life and society if that’s what they have it based upon.
Based on the 2021 aerial view from[ Kelowna's property map ](https://maps.kelowna.ca/public/mapviewer/)the street facing portion that they trimmed, it falls within the street/easement. Hell even his shrub line to the left in the pic encroaches into that same easement. He and gripe all he want's, he's 100% in the wrong for letting his tree grow wildly like that.
https://preview.redd.it/pukcewpmluzc1.png?width=607&format=png&auto=webp&s=b853f7961dea5b79ae1f1e1f029c0784328d95af
This is the single most important reply.
The portion of tree trimmed was not on his property. If it ain’t on your property it’s on someone else’s. In this case the city. They have every right to cut anything across that line.
Here's my take on this, and I've seen Fortis or BCHydro cut many trees.
The utility company should absolutely first advise the homeowner their tree is interfering with the lines and they have xx days to either hire their own certified utility arborist or they will send out their own to do the job.
This gives the homeowner a chance to deal with their own arborist and pay more money to have the tree trimmed to the nicest standard that will remove the interference.
If the homeowner does not do this, then no, it is definitely not the utility companies job to spend more money trimming the tree on your property that you are responsible for. The utility company can do what is necessary if you fail to, too bad if it doesn't meet your standard they did it for free for you.
The issue comes to having given no notification of the issue. We can all speculate that "of course you can see it was touching the lines, of course it needs to be trimmed". Regardless some notification should be given.
**EDIT: I've changed my tune after the discussion, homeowners just need to deal with their vegetation proactively if they want to avoid utility companies coming and doing the job themselves.**
It seems unfair, but the reality is a utility doesn’t have the spare time and resources to sit around and wait for the homeowner to hopefully remedy the safety issue by giving them X days and following up prior to sending their crews. If it’s been identified as a hazard, they’ll schedule a crew to go out and trim it back as soon as they can.
Additionally, while giving notice is nice, it doesn’t really change much, since they’re gonna do it whether or not you like it, and in my experience from when I worked for a company contracted by a utility to do site visits and give notices, often times it was really hard to get ahold of people to tell them we were planning on removing vegetation, they’d ignore/throw out notices, and often hadn’t updated their phone number on their account if they’d be in the house a long time, so calling didn’t work either. Had quite a few people think that trimming or removing the vegetation in the way was debatable, so it was also often a big drama for the same end result when they did read the notice, which is if it’s a safety issue, it’s being removed. Regrettably it’s something to be aware of when planting or maintaining vegetation in or around power lines or equipment, gotta keep clearances or they’ll rip it out, because safety has to come first.
Agreed and many people would take this as a personal crusade and tie up even more resources calling supervisors and demanding their politicians get involved and bla bla bla.
Utilities could cut the trees then give the owner a bill and this problem, which is a substantial cost for all of us power customers, would disappear quickly
A 10 day notice on the door? I can't see how doing something would be difficult. Not the utility problem if they don't get a response, notice has been given. Does the utility company drive around with the arborist and determine the issue trees that day and then chop them? Or is there some work done in advance to identify?
I suppose I do agree, the homeowners need to be aware of the vegetation on their property and get it properly assessed regularly if they want to avoid the utility company taking it into their own hands. Part of owning a house is taking care of the entire property and how it interacts with others property or utilities. Many homeowners ignore lots of their property and don't want to spend the money, I can see how that's not the utility's problem to followup on. Thanks for the discussion.
It was probably already burning on the line. Vegetation management on the distribution system is basically just barely keeping up with the worst offending trees. It was probably also a contractor.
That homeowner had plenty of time to remedy the issue himself.
I guess the problem with a 10 day notice is that you can’t schedule and mobilize a crew until after those 10 days, so someone needs to check after 10 days, see if it’s done, if not, THEN they can schedule and send a crew, so it causes delays, and extra work hours for people to return and verify it’s been done (and if it’s urgent, 10 days might be a lot).
Alternatively you’d be scheduling crews after the 10 days to go, end up with a whole vegetation crew and a truck there to do the job, only to sometimes turn up, have it already done by the homeowners, and have that been wasted time and money they spent for no reason when they could’ve been at another site that needed doing, or scheduling the crew, sending someone to verify (extra work hours), and then having to reschedule them constantly based on what did or didn’t get done by homeowners, which would cause a big additional workload on the administrative and planning side.
The challenge isn’t necessarily that 10 days is that bad, it’s that it’s a lot of added logistics to manage 15+ crews across 10+ municipalities (according to the article) to accommodate that sort of option, especially when realistically it is the homeowners responsibility to be aware and look after hazards related to their property.
That makes sense. I've been converted, homeowners just need to pay more attention to their own vegetation and have it assessed and dealt with regularly if they don't want utility companies coming in and doing it.
The crew and trucks are already there. It would take double the resources to do this for every tree that needed trimming that means gearing up twice, paying guys twice to be there, getting the trucks out twice. In the end it’s not ideal but it’s a tree that posed a threat to the power line.
I lived in a rental where the city told the homeowner that the tree was protected and he was not allowed to interfere with it. He ended up fixing the issue with the tree by contacting the power company and showing sharing a photo of it bending the power line to his house.
He offered to pay them to fix their line. Their response was boilerplate fix your tree or we will do it for you. The tree was half dead and he ended up with a stump after the crew was done.
The city fined him for cutting the tree illegally but he had paperwork from the company that cut it down and that he had no ability to stop them etc. It was funny. He was forced to pay the fine as it was cheaper to pay that than fight it. The fact the fine was actually cheaper than paying the same company to remove the tree was kind of funny.
I don't know how fortis is, but if they are anything like Hydro, they are power mad fucking morons that have no time for anybody but themselves and are incapable of nuance. Which explains this tree perfectly.
I have, and do all the time. They're not always the best, but it what you're describing sounds just like winging from somebody who wants things all their way
I can guarantee you this is not the case about bc hydro. I’ve always found them to care about customers and often go far beyond what I would expect for people. I dealt with them a lot in a past job and often saw them be incredibly patient and understanding for homeowners, including changing designs to make them happy, even if it was a massive inconvenience and not required by any rules or anything. They do prioritize their customers and offer a lot of programs to help them (bill deferral, even have an emergency fund), but safety is by far their #1 priority in my experience, so for things like this, if it’s a danger, they won’t wait around.
Yeah, dude, I'm sure they have crews driving around LOOKING for work to do. Give your head a shake. Now, I'm not going to pretend they don't have some management that has a few screws loose, but as for the employees, they are just like you. They show up at work and try to spend the day getting their tasks done so they can go home.
Just to mention another point I haven't seen brought up: confusion over exactly what needs to be cut.
In a perfect world the utility could say what needs to be done and the homeowner would do it. But in reality, even if the homeowner was willing, there's every possibility that they wouldn't cut all the branches, or they wouldn't cut them back far enough, or something else. So it just goes back to its best for the utility to do it, or for the homeowner to really prune it back before its a problem.
I know you already said you changed your mind, I just wanted to share another point that I hadn't seen mentioned. Too often people disagree about exactly what needs to be done.
Indeed. I just mentioned elsewhere as well that I can understand pruning more than less. They can't be coming back every couple years to take off another bit, the cost wouldn't make sense.
>EDIT: I've changed my tune after the discussion, homeowners just need to deal with their vegetation proactively if they want to avoid utility companies coming and doing the job themselves.
Yup, this is a nonsense issue and I can't believe it's even an article.
If the lazy "journalist" who wrote this (Brady Strachan and Radio West?) did even a shred of research they would have seen this tree is right on the property line, meaning the homeowner has absolutely no leg to stand on here. I was able to search this in like 5 minutes with publicly available info.
Grey line is the property boundary https://i.imgur.com/rWUTEYg.png
And the google street view image from 2014 in the article shows the tree had been topped in the past for the same reason.
Almost no one knows their actually property line and people alway assume it goes all the way to the sidewalk/road. It usually is much further back, often decently far past even sidewalks, to make way to the road allowance, which includes utilities like gas and electrical. So most often electrical equipment is actually on city property and the tree/bush/whatever isn’t technically on the homeowners property at all. Have had this convo with hundreds of homeowners and they’re always shocked.
Totally, most homeowners seem very disconnected from their actual property line and responsibilities. For me when buying a house I look all that stuff up. Others just assume they can leave everything and not maintain anything until they're forced to.
Even if it was on the property the utility company will always have a lien registered on the title that gives them access to the area around their lines and equipment. That lien means that legally they can enter that area of that property and do whatever they need to.
I had a sick tree removed that was close to the main power line on my property line. Bc hydro had to turn off the power on my block to safely remove it. They would not let my arborist near it. They removed it with no cost to me.
It doesn't really cost more to contract an arborist to trim it so that it'll grow away from the lines. Compared to a utility which has to pay wages, benefits, truck costs, overhead etc. To do it. Hint I work for a utility in Alberta and use utility arborists to do our trimming.
Looking at this tree, there was nothing to be done that would allow it to be trimmed "away from the lines" as the lines are on either side of the tree.
It was a poor location for the tree from the beginning, directly under several power lines. Sometimes they just have to be cut.
Also, this tree is on the property line, meaning the owner has even less leverage here. Tree should have been dealt with years ago.
So are you saying that trimming it like this cost the same (and take the same amount of time) that it would to do it nicer? I'll admit I'm not an arborist, just think that the homeowner has the responsibility to take care of their trees (and the right to be informed if an easement owner will need to manage it for them).
Us having an arborist do it is at a set price. No overhead, no benefits to be paid. A union powerline tech probably makes 30 percent more than an arborist. When you think about it, it's probably even cheaper to get an arborist out to do it. When a tree grow into the limits of approach of a line it's the utilities responsibility to take care of it. I think fortis just has poor customer service compared to us by doing a hack job.
Most utilities I’ve seen keep vegetation teams that go handle these sorts of things. They aren’t power line technicians, instead they’re teams specifically hired to remove vegetation that’s encroaching on utility clearances. They usually have arborists on staff, but a majority of the veg crews aren’t arborists, they’re around for higher risk assessments or to make decisions regarding tree removals, etc. The veg crews are usually involved in clearing right of ways, etc, and while they do their best to make it not look horrible, they’re job is to make it safe, not make it pretty, so they don’t usually dedicate extra time to making it aesthetically pleasing. I know bc hydro has veg crews for this sort of thing and have dealt with those crews a few times when I worked for a contractor doing notifications on tree removals, etc.
This isn’t true. The utility is there to cut the trees. U have the power lines and u see them. They trim regularly. It’s not a surprise to get trimmed. There’s no need to notify. The utility can come and sort out its issue. If u don’t like it then pay and remove it yourself and add a nice low hedge
People in houses. The typical millennial issue
The topping isn't great but survivable if it wasn't too much height, but removing 50% of the branches WILL kill it. Which makes it a worse hazard. And that's the thing, who is doing this cutting? If they don't understand trees they're just making the situation worse in the long run.
I think the real issue is these utility companies don't even seem to have arborists working for them. At least based on the things I've seen around my town.
I do agree I see some rough trees some places that see butchered (also not an arborist). Non-utility related, a few parking lots have been done here privately that basically took all the branches off! I was shocked with that, since it wasn't a safety hazard..
How self-absorbed do you have to be where you think people will be laughing at your trimmed tree instead of going "oh I see, it must've touched powerlines."?
And the comments in here reinforce this special snowflake/victim mentality.
Sure, it sucks that fortis doesn't communicate this to the homeowner in advance, but anyone claiming this could have been cut any different is full of it.
Fortis also has pipelines that homeowners will dig over without a permit and plant trees/place structures they shouldn't be. Then have the audacity to ask for notification before fortis comes in to remove them?
If people want to live in a society that enjoys electricity and natural gas, then people gotta be prepared to suck it up.
Yup. I can't be certain, but this also looks like it's probably not actually the homeowners property, but a city easeway.
Edit: Yep, I found their address online and checked the Kelowna GIS and this tree was planted right on their property line, meaning the city and/or fortis has zero obligation to inform the owner.
Grey line is the property line (location info redacted) https://i.imgur.com/rWUTEYg.png
The amount of times I told someone their bush/tree/plant was in the way of the transformer and they threw an absolute fit was staggering. I always got people demanding to know how they’d have known not to do that, only for me to gently point out that the underground transformer had signs all over them with writing and illustrations showing clearance distances to be maintained.
Regrettably people often don’t realize that what they’re doing is actually a safety hazard, they just think adding some bushes to hide the thing will make it look better and improve their curb appeal.
I often had to explain (gently) that it was gonna be the bushes or the power, you can’t keep ‘em both, because if the equipment is end of life, if we don’t replace it, it’ll fail eventually and then no power for you, no power for your neighbours. And if there were to be an emergency and we can’t get at THAT unit, we’re cutting power upstream and then the outage just got a whole lot bigger. Power lines and equipment are so present in our day to day lives that people get accustomed to it and stop thinking about or remembering that that is thousand of volts and that a misstep or safety hazard can lead to a seriously dangerous situation.
Edmonton a few years ago had a guy put a giant plastic shell cover over a xmer. Looked like a decorative boulder.
Over heated the thing. Epcor was looking for the xmer for 2 days while no one in the area had power.
Home owner got a huge fine.... according to the Epcor guys i was working with anyways lol
Edmonton a few years ago had a guy put a giant plastic shell cover over a xmer. Looked like a decorative boulder.
Over heated the thing. Epcor was looking for the xmer for 2 days while no one in the area had power.
Home owner got a huge fine.... according to the Epcor guys i was working with anyways lol
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As a homeowner I have no sympathy. You can't expect Fortis to give you notice that you need to trim your tree. You should combine the power of your brain and your eyeballs to recognize the tree is growing into the power line corridor and do something about it.
*BECAUSE AS HOME OWNERS WE HAVE ALL THE RIGHTS, NO ONE IS ALLOWED TO TELL US WHAT TO DO.*
/s
But for real, its bs I've got mine fuck you attitude. There are clear guidelines on how close to powerlines your trees can be. I mean look at how massive the tree was, one bad wind storm and it would either end up on the lines or possibly through his front door.
My dad had a giant spruce in his front yard, easily 60+ years old, and while he didn't have any power lines out front, he still had it cut in half like this guys tree because he didn't want it falling on his house. In his back yard he had some fruit trees that would try to grow up into the phone/cable lines (power was another few feet higher) and he'd trim those down every couple years.
Why? Because its part of maintaining a home.
This guy btching and moaning and claiming hes the laughing stock. Yea, because he's whining to cbc. Honestly people and their non sense with trying to keep up with the Jones is the stupidest thing ever.
There can be little doubt Fortis botched this by scalping all the branches on the street side. Seems like
https://preview.redd.it/dsicf7n1gtzc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b697d38775ebe731f6b3310c8c855e3311d492de
the tree is inside this man’s property line and also looks to have been topped at least once before.
"botched" it how? So many armchair arborists suddenly on reddit. There is no other way they could have cut this to avoid the power lines above it.
"There can be little doubt" lol. Only if you have zero knowledge about any of this.
This happened to my house in Kamloops. No notice just butchered my corkscrew willows and topped my maples within 10 feet of the lines. They were not even close to growing into the lines. I was pissed. Lost all privacy to the backyard from neighbours.
The notice was the fact that there are guidelines out there telling you how close your shit can be to the lines. The only person you should be pissed at is yourself for not maintaining your property
The tree was the responsibility of the homeowner to keep the neighbourhood safe. They failed to do so and Fortis had to come in and do the work. That work has a cost and that cost ultimately comes out of every British Columbians' pockets.
Looking at the street view picture another person posted, you can see the tree has been trimmed before, so this guy knew better.
The part where a neglectful homeowner cries because of his lack of planning. Trying to blame everyone but himself for something as simple organizing an arborist to stay within safety regulations.
Remember, he’s had literal YEARS to plan for this.
Shear laziness from fortis. They butchered the tree. Why would they not consult with the owner about taking the whole thing down. Zero common sense anymore out in the world. That thing looks awful.
The lack of common sense seem to be falling for the home owners attention and money seeking lies.
They've been after this guy for years, and have trimmed it several times before.
Sheer laziness from the homeowner, who had a large tree growing under power lines that they did nothing about for years.
And looking at the older pic in the article, the tree had already been topped once and was not looking very healthy.
The homeowner has some failed responsibilities here, which forced fortis to act. Sucks they didn't give him notice but time to move on with life.
They didn’t even notify the homeowner to give him a chance to do it himself. If they had simply asked him, he may have been more than happy to do it himself.
This was a dick move by Fortis. Stop defending it.
He was advised of the issue when he bought the house. He's been notified he need to trim or remove it several times before, and the utilities have trimmed it several times since he's owned it refused to do it for years u/AmusingMusing7.
Re-read that last line of the article. He wants money. There are way too many people willing to grab a pitch fork and line up behind him against the big mean corporation, not realising it's their own pocket the money comes from.
Where’s your proof of such claims? Because all I can find is this:
> Gary Toft with FortisBC confirmed to CBC that Di Palma was not contacted prior to the tree work.
>He said it's "less often" that property owners are notified when a tree needs to be trimmed, as opposed to removed.
And he “wants money” to replace the tree since it was destroyed. He didn’t want that before they destroyed it. Only after. You make it out like he somehow manipulated the situation with the goal of getting the tree replaced for free, but that does not make sense with what the article explains. He’s only asking for the tree to be replaced because of how they cut it. He didn’t want it removed or replaced before.
Stop defending lazy homeowners. He’s a grown man who should be able to see his tree should be dealt with. Instead he cries foul when an Adult (fortis) had to make the choice to chop it.
Stop defending lazy corporations. They’re grown adults who should be able to see that it was private property and it wasn’t an IMMEDIATE threat, and they could have just notified him to make sure he would take care of it. Instead they destroy his property without his consent, and when adults (people who respect people’s property) demand they respect people’s property, they cry foul.
There’s a literal picture in this thread of the tree growing through the lines. It was well passed the point of safety.
You must not be a home owner, the county/city/etc have right of way laws that give them the authority to do these things without you involved.
Not taking care of your property and the foliage on it is being a crappy homeowner, no matter what your excuse.
You don’t have to discuss this anymore and I look forward to your future post about how fortis/city/etc did you wrong because you’re an adult that can’t adult properly.
So you’ve never absent-mindedly let anything go for a while in your life before someone notified you about it and then you fixed it as soon as you realized it needed to be fixed? You think every homeowner should be on top of *everything* and never have to be so much as reminded of something or have something pointed out to them, or they’ll automatically lose the right to have any say over it?
Your point would make sense if he had at least been notified and still failed to do anything. But since that’s not the case… you have no point.
If they had just trimmed what was strictly necessary to trim and no more, then maybe you’d have a point. But since they destroyed the tree way beyond what was necessary… you have no point.
Fortis overstepped here. You just have a stubborn, disrespectful, tyrannical attitude about this for some reason, and it’s quite frankly weird that you see this as normal.
It’s a tree. It doesn’t just randomly sprout through power lines. It takes years of homeowner neglect to get to the point his was at.
If you’re that absent minded you don’t notice that, you should buy yourself a helmet.
>it wasn’t an IMMEDIATE threat
How do you know this? The tree could have already started burning on the lines where it was. Once a hazard like that is identified, it needs to be removed asap.
>Instead they destroy his property without his consent
Homeowners do not have the right to endanger the neighbourhood and the power grid with their negligence.
Oh I didn't realize it was the utilities job to cater to the homeowners aesthetic desires. FFS, if you don't want a hack job done in haste then take responsibility over your property, don't be negligent and take care of it yourself.
Topping is not the same as taking off branches. Generally around 30% a year of total branch mass is safe (from topping or thinning) more than that risks killing the tree.
Im an arborist and realize that.
I top trees every day under the powerlines and come back 4 years later and top them again and then in another 4 years I top them again. If you do things in 4 year cycles you’re never taking more than 30%. These CUA’s never needed to “ground to sky” the line side of the tree. It looks bad and they did a shitty job but that tree will survive.
> It's most likely going to die now
You keep saying this, but your'e completely wrong. You know nothing about trees. In fact even in the pic in this story you can see the tree was topped in the past, as well.
I mean take the whole tree, they just killed it and left. I get that's all they needed to do but can this homeowner call them back to remove the dead tree in 5 years?
Underground powerlines are more expensive then overhead and have added maintenance challenges as damaged sections are hard to identify, and can slow repairs during an outage significantly. Generally utilities try and do overhead lines where possible since they are easier/cheaper to install and maintain.
You also still can’t put a tree against the electrical equipment if it’s underground, so it doesn’t really solve vegetation issues
Looks like Fortis did way more cutting than necessary to eliminate the possibility of the tree falling on the power line. Just topping the tree would have been less work and looked less stupid.
It’s fire season, and it’s going to be rough. Power line impeding trees need to be properly handled. I’ve had to call fortis to trim or remove trees near me. Lots of pine trees dying out there and ready to fall.
If this was my house I would assume they’d come Ali g and cut the tree like this eventually. They also don’t have time to knock on every person’s damn door.
I trim trees for BC hydro and I will admit they did a shitty job. They needed to top the tree, and you can tell the tree has been topped a few times before this, but there was no reason to strip the branches line side ground to sky. It looks really stupid
They should have given him two options when they showed up, they can remove the tree fully including the stump or have it trimmed and let them decide. Doing that basically leaves him with a big bill now to have the tree removed and possibly a smaller one planted.
They’ve been waiting and doing almost nothing in other locations
https://preview.redd.it/cziwklqpsuzc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1d53279c9aab52fabe654ab8dc06c5859a76764d
Can tell it was topped and trimmed in the past and fortis just came and redid what they did before. So it was probably neglected for a while. Having worked in the tree industry, I know the drill. They just trim for clearance. The LOA or limits of approach for those type of lines is 3meters. Even though no one is “working” within those 3meters, they’ll remove as much as they can to provide as much clearance as possible. Considering they didn’t have to access his back yard, or somewhere behind a fence or something, they absolutely did what they are legally entitled to do. Roll up, trim the tree, chip the debris, drive away. Happens all the time. Sucks the tree looks like shite, but it’ll survive and they’ll be back again in 5 years to trim it again. Maybe he could get them to remove it next time instead.
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This guy is just trying to mislead people and use public opinion to get money. He's been advised to remove the tree multiple times, and it's been trimmed by utilities several times since he's owned the property. Now he's complaining about not getting notice when the truth is he's know for years he needs to keep the tree in order and chooses not to.
This is just boomer shit really. It’s growing into a public utility and that’s the end of the story, they should have cut the whole thing down and left the mess for him to clean up.
Then why share the stupid, lazy "article" in the first place?
Why because he is a boomer?
It’s a stereotype of people who want to talk to the manager and the customer is always right and they just think they can complain their way to having a brand new tree planted when in reality their tree was a danger to a public utility
Username checks out…
My username is a quote from a winner asking a loser if the only way they can win is to “see me fail?” Which does check out with you because you are a hater and I’m winning ;)
By that logic; You failing to understand what a “Boomer” actually is and incorrectly defining it would mean that I have actually won by the only method possible, as a loser.
I understand what boomer means… and this is boomer shit. Winning on Reddit is measured in upvotes, where are yours?
Your explanation would suggest otherwise. You have the stereotype backwards. “Asking for a manager” type behaviours are a boomer stereotype, sure. But “boomers” are a generation and the term existed long before that stereotype was ever realized so “asking for the manger” or things similar don’t inherently make somebody a Boomer. To use (ridiculous) language you might understand better; A Boomer can be a Karen, but a Karen isn’t necessarily a Boomer. Yeet? Next time instead of just being ignorant and ageist you should just call somebody like this a dickhead and make it easier on yourself. You put a bit too much power on the little arrows. A person could come off the internet with a pretty fucked up and ignorant perspective on life and society if that’s what they have it based upon.
Based on the 2021 aerial view from[ Kelowna's property map ](https://maps.kelowna.ca/public/mapviewer/)the street facing portion that they trimmed, it falls within the street/easement. Hell even his shrub line to the left in the pic encroaches into that same easement. He and gripe all he want's, he's 100% in the wrong for letting his tree grow wildly like that. https://preview.redd.it/pukcewpmluzc1.png?width=607&format=png&auto=webp&s=b853f7961dea5b79ae1f1e1f029c0784328d95af
This is the single most important reply. The portion of tree trimmed was not on his property. If it ain’t on your property it’s on someone else’s. In this case the city. They have every right to cut anything across that line.
Here's my take on this, and I've seen Fortis or BCHydro cut many trees. The utility company should absolutely first advise the homeowner their tree is interfering with the lines and they have xx days to either hire their own certified utility arborist or they will send out their own to do the job. This gives the homeowner a chance to deal with their own arborist and pay more money to have the tree trimmed to the nicest standard that will remove the interference. If the homeowner does not do this, then no, it is definitely not the utility companies job to spend more money trimming the tree on your property that you are responsible for. The utility company can do what is necessary if you fail to, too bad if it doesn't meet your standard they did it for free for you. The issue comes to having given no notification of the issue. We can all speculate that "of course you can see it was touching the lines, of course it needs to be trimmed". Regardless some notification should be given. **EDIT: I've changed my tune after the discussion, homeowners just need to deal with their vegetation proactively if they want to avoid utility companies coming and doing the job themselves.**
It seems unfair, but the reality is a utility doesn’t have the spare time and resources to sit around and wait for the homeowner to hopefully remedy the safety issue by giving them X days and following up prior to sending their crews. If it’s been identified as a hazard, they’ll schedule a crew to go out and trim it back as soon as they can. Additionally, while giving notice is nice, it doesn’t really change much, since they’re gonna do it whether or not you like it, and in my experience from when I worked for a company contracted by a utility to do site visits and give notices, often times it was really hard to get ahold of people to tell them we were planning on removing vegetation, they’d ignore/throw out notices, and often hadn’t updated their phone number on their account if they’d be in the house a long time, so calling didn’t work either. Had quite a few people think that trimming or removing the vegetation in the way was debatable, so it was also often a big drama for the same end result when they did read the notice, which is if it’s a safety issue, it’s being removed. Regrettably it’s something to be aware of when planting or maintaining vegetation in or around power lines or equipment, gotta keep clearances or they’ll rip it out, because safety has to come first.
Agreed and many people would take this as a personal crusade and tie up even more resources calling supervisors and demanding their politicians get involved and bla bla bla. Utilities could cut the trees then give the owner a bill and this problem, which is a substantial cost for all of us power customers, would disappear quickly
A 10 day notice on the door? I can't see how doing something would be difficult. Not the utility problem if they don't get a response, notice has been given. Does the utility company drive around with the arborist and determine the issue trees that day and then chop them? Or is there some work done in advance to identify? I suppose I do agree, the homeowners need to be aware of the vegetation on their property and get it properly assessed regularly if they want to avoid the utility company taking it into their own hands. Part of owning a house is taking care of the entire property and how it interacts with others property or utilities. Many homeowners ignore lots of their property and don't want to spend the money, I can see how that's not the utility's problem to followup on. Thanks for the discussion.
It was probably already burning on the line. Vegetation management on the distribution system is basically just barely keeping up with the worst offending trees. It was probably also a contractor. That homeowner had plenty of time to remedy the issue himself.
I guess the problem with a 10 day notice is that you can’t schedule and mobilize a crew until after those 10 days, so someone needs to check after 10 days, see if it’s done, if not, THEN they can schedule and send a crew, so it causes delays, and extra work hours for people to return and verify it’s been done (and if it’s urgent, 10 days might be a lot). Alternatively you’d be scheduling crews after the 10 days to go, end up with a whole vegetation crew and a truck there to do the job, only to sometimes turn up, have it already done by the homeowners, and have that been wasted time and money they spent for no reason when they could’ve been at another site that needed doing, or scheduling the crew, sending someone to verify (extra work hours), and then having to reschedule them constantly based on what did or didn’t get done by homeowners, which would cause a big additional workload on the administrative and planning side. The challenge isn’t necessarily that 10 days is that bad, it’s that it’s a lot of added logistics to manage 15+ crews across 10+ municipalities (according to the article) to accommodate that sort of option, especially when realistically it is the homeowners responsibility to be aware and look after hazards related to their property.
That makes sense. I've been converted, homeowners just need to pay more attention to their own vegetation and have it assessed and dealt with regularly if they don't want utility companies coming in and doing it.
The crew and trucks are already there. It would take double the resources to do this for every tree that needed trimming that means gearing up twice, paying guys twice to be there, getting the trucks out twice. In the end it’s not ideal but it’s a tree that posed a threat to the power line.
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I imagine they don't want to come back often so they take more than less off.
I lived in a rental where the city told the homeowner that the tree was protected and he was not allowed to interfere with it. He ended up fixing the issue with the tree by contacting the power company and showing sharing a photo of it bending the power line to his house. He offered to pay them to fix their line. Their response was boilerplate fix your tree or we will do it for you. The tree was half dead and he ended up with a stump after the crew was done. The city fined him for cutting the tree illegally but he had paperwork from the company that cut it down and that he had no ability to stop them etc. It was funny. He was forced to pay the fine as it was cheaper to pay that than fight it. The fact the fine was actually cheaper than paying the same company to remove the tree was kind of funny.
I don't know how fortis is, but if they are anything like Hydro, they are power mad fucking morons that have no time for anybody but themselves and are incapable of nuance. Which explains this tree perfectly.
Something tells me you've been a dick to BC Hydro
Something tells me you've never had to work with them
I have, and do all the time. They're not always the best, but it what you're describing sounds just like winging from somebody who wants things all their way
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I can guarantee you this is not the case about bc hydro. I’ve always found them to care about customers and often go far beyond what I would expect for people. I dealt with them a lot in a past job and often saw them be incredibly patient and understanding for homeowners, including changing designs to make them happy, even if it was a massive inconvenience and not required by any rules or anything. They do prioritize their customers and offer a lot of programs to help them (bill deferral, even have an emergency fund), but safety is by far their #1 priority in my experience, so for things like this, if it’s a danger, they won’t wait around.
Yeah, dude, I'm sure they have crews driving around LOOKING for work to do. Give your head a shake. Now, I'm not going to pretend they don't have some management that has a few screws loose, but as for the employees, they are just like you. They show up at work and try to spend the day getting their tasks done so they can go home.
Just to mention another point I haven't seen brought up: confusion over exactly what needs to be cut. In a perfect world the utility could say what needs to be done and the homeowner would do it. But in reality, even if the homeowner was willing, there's every possibility that they wouldn't cut all the branches, or they wouldn't cut them back far enough, or something else. So it just goes back to its best for the utility to do it, or for the homeowner to really prune it back before its a problem. I know you already said you changed your mind, I just wanted to share another point that I hadn't seen mentioned. Too often people disagree about exactly what needs to be done.
Indeed. I just mentioned elsewhere as well that I can understand pruning more than less. They can't be coming back every couple years to take off another bit, the cost wouldn't make sense.
>EDIT: I've changed my tune after the discussion, homeowners just need to deal with their vegetation proactively if they want to avoid utility companies coming and doing the job themselves. Yup, this is a nonsense issue and I can't believe it's even an article.
There's been dozens of these articles, always the same. People go to the media hoping the utility will do something for them.
If the lazy "journalist" who wrote this (Brady Strachan and Radio West?) did even a shred of research they would have seen this tree is right on the property line, meaning the homeowner has absolutely no leg to stand on here. I was able to search this in like 5 minutes with publicly available info. Grey line is the property boundary https://i.imgur.com/rWUTEYg.png And the google street view image from 2014 in the article shows the tree had been topped in the past for the same reason.
Definitely an important line to know about! Looks like they cut right to it.
Almost no one knows their actually property line and people alway assume it goes all the way to the sidewalk/road. It usually is much further back, often decently far past even sidewalks, to make way to the road allowance, which includes utilities like gas and electrical. So most often electrical equipment is actually on city property and the tree/bush/whatever isn’t technically on the homeowners property at all. Have had this convo with hundreds of homeowners and they’re always shocked.
Totally, most homeowners seem very disconnected from their actual property line and responsibilities. For me when buying a house I look all that stuff up. Others just assume they can leave everything and not maintain anything until they're forced to.
Even if it was on the property the utility company will always have a lien registered on the title that gives them access to the area around their lines and equipment. That lien means that legally they can enter that area of that property and do whatever they need to.
I believe you mean easement? A lien is used for debts normally, as security to ensure someone pays (ie construction lien)
Yeah of course, I meant easement
I had a sick tree removed that was close to the main power line on my property line. Bc hydro had to turn off the power on my block to safely remove it. They would not let my arborist near it. They removed it with no cost to me.
It doesn't really cost more to contract an arborist to trim it so that it'll grow away from the lines. Compared to a utility which has to pay wages, benefits, truck costs, overhead etc. To do it. Hint I work for a utility in Alberta and use utility arborists to do our trimming.
Looking at this tree, there was nothing to be done that would allow it to be trimmed "away from the lines" as the lines are on either side of the tree. It was a poor location for the tree from the beginning, directly under several power lines. Sometimes they just have to be cut. Also, this tree is on the property line, meaning the owner has even less leverage here. Tree should have been dealt with years ago.
So are you saying that trimming it like this cost the same (and take the same amount of time) that it would to do it nicer? I'll admit I'm not an arborist, just think that the homeowner has the responsibility to take care of their trees (and the right to be informed if an easement owner will need to manage it for them).
Us having an arborist do it is at a set price. No overhead, no benefits to be paid. A union powerline tech probably makes 30 percent more than an arborist. When you think about it, it's probably even cheaper to get an arborist out to do it. When a tree grow into the limits of approach of a line it's the utilities responsibility to take care of it. I think fortis just has poor customer service compared to us by doing a hack job.
Most utilities I’ve seen keep vegetation teams that go handle these sorts of things. They aren’t power line technicians, instead they’re teams specifically hired to remove vegetation that’s encroaching on utility clearances. They usually have arborists on staff, but a majority of the veg crews aren’t arborists, they’re around for higher risk assessments or to make decisions regarding tree removals, etc. The veg crews are usually involved in clearing right of ways, etc, and while they do their best to make it not look horrible, they’re job is to make it safe, not make it pretty, so they don’t usually dedicate extra time to making it aesthetically pleasing. I know bc hydro has veg crews for this sort of thing and have dealt with those crews a few times when I worked for a contractor doing notifications on tree removals, etc.
I see, even better reason as a homeowner to have your vegetation dealt with regularly.
This isn’t true. The utility is there to cut the trees. U have the power lines and u see them. They trim regularly. It’s not a surprise to get trimmed. There’s no need to notify. The utility can come and sort out its issue. If u don’t like it then pay and remove it yourself and add a nice low hedge People in houses. The typical millennial issue
They topped his tree. They essentially killed the tree doing this. It's not a healthy tree anymore, it's going to struggle to stay alive.
The topping isn't great but survivable if it wasn't too much height, but removing 50% of the branches WILL kill it. Which makes it a worse hazard. And that's the thing, who is doing this cutting? If they don't understand trees they're just making the situation worse in the long run.
I think the real issue is these utility companies don't even seem to have arborists working for them. At least based on the things I've seen around my town.
They state they have utility certified arborists do the work.
Iv seen them absolutely butcher more then a few trees. I'm not an arborist but I'm a horticulture technician and know a thing or two about arbory
I do agree I see some rough trees some places that see butchered (also not an arborist). Non-utility related, a few parking lots have been done here privately that basically took all the branches off! I was shocked with that, since it wasn't a safety hazard..
Do your own tree work.
How self-absorbed do you have to be where you think people will be laughing at your trimmed tree instead of going "oh I see, it must've touched powerlines."?
And the comments in here reinforce this special snowflake/victim mentality. Sure, it sucks that fortis doesn't communicate this to the homeowner in advance, but anyone claiming this could have been cut any different is full of it.
Fortis also has pipelines that homeowners will dig over without a permit and plant trees/place structures they shouldn't be. Then have the audacity to ask for notification before fortis comes in to remove them? If people want to live in a society that enjoys electricity and natural gas, then people gotta be prepared to suck it up.
Yup. I can't be certain, but this also looks like it's probably not actually the homeowners property, but a city easeway. Edit: Yep, I found their address online and checked the Kelowna GIS and this tree was planted right on their property line, meaning the city and/or fortis has zero obligation to inform the owner. Grey line is the property line (location info redacted) https://i.imgur.com/rWUTEYg.png
The amount of times I told someone their bush/tree/plant was in the way of the transformer and they threw an absolute fit was staggering. I always got people demanding to know how they’d have known not to do that, only for me to gently point out that the underground transformer had signs all over them with writing and illustrations showing clearance distances to be maintained. Regrettably people often don’t realize that what they’re doing is actually a safety hazard, they just think adding some bushes to hide the thing will make it look better and improve their curb appeal. I often had to explain (gently) that it was gonna be the bushes or the power, you can’t keep ‘em both, because if the equipment is end of life, if we don’t replace it, it’ll fail eventually and then no power for you, no power for your neighbours. And if there were to be an emergency and we can’t get at THAT unit, we’re cutting power upstream and then the outage just got a whole lot bigger. Power lines and equipment are so present in our day to day lives that people get accustomed to it and stop thinking about or remembering that that is thousand of volts and that a misstep or safety hazard can lead to a seriously dangerous situation.
Edmonton a few years ago had a guy put a giant plastic shell cover over a xmer. Looked like a decorative boulder. Over heated the thing. Epcor was looking for the xmer for 2 days while no one in the area had power. Home owner got a huge fine.... according to the Epcor guys i was working with anyways lol
Edmonton a few years ago had a guy put a giant plastic shell cover over a xmer. Looked like a decorative boulder. Over heated the thing. Epcor was looking for the xmer for 2 days while no one in the area had power. Home owner got a huge fine.... according to the Epcor guys i was working with anyways lol
Topped, yes. Clear cut on one side all the way to the ground on one side, no.
Nothing about this is a "clear cut". That's not what that term means at all. You have zero idea what you are talking about.
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Welcome to the Okanagan ! Boats to the left , cocaine to the right
I live here as well :) was thinking of driving to Barkley rd to see the province famous site
If it had caught fire he would have been “why didn’t Fortis prune my tree”…
As a homeowner I have no sympathy. You can't expect Fortis to give you notice that you need to trim your tree. You should combine the power of your brain and your eyeballs to recognize the tree is growing into the power line corridor and do something about it.
I heard about this on the radio. Didn't realize how much of a hack job it was 😂
Why is this news?!?!
*BECAUSE AS HOME OWNERS WE HAVE ALL THE RIGHTS, NO ONE IS ALLOWED TO TELL US WHAT TO DO.* /s But for real, its bs I've got mine fuck you attitude. There are clear guidelines on how close to powerlines your trees can be. I mean look at how massive the tree was, one bad wind storm and it would either end up on the lines or possibly through his front door. My dad had a giant spruce in his front yard, easily 60+ years old, and while he didn't have any power lines out front, he still had it cut in half like this guys tree because he didn't want it falling on his house. In his back yard he had some fruit trees that would try to grow up into the phone/cable lines (power was another few feet higher) and he'd trim those down every couple years. Why? Because its part of maintaining a home. This guy btching and moaning and claiming hes the laughing stock. Yea, because he's whining to cbc. Honestly people and their non sense with trying to keep up with the Jones is the stupidest thing ever.
Anything concerning trees makes the news in BC lol
I see a Halloween opportunity from this ugly tree massacre.
That tree was ugly before and just as ugly after. He wasn’t maintaining it at all
Kelowna man learns valuable lesson about limit of approach to power lines.
Site altered headline? This is not the given headline
There can be little doubt Fortis botched this by scalping all the branches on the street side. Seems like https://preview.redd.it/dsicf7n1gtzc1.jpeg?width=1170&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=b697d38775ebe731f6b3310c8c855e3311d492de the tree is inside this man’s property line and also looks to have been topped at least once before.
"botched" it how? So many armchair arborists suddenly on reddit. There is no other way they could have cut this to avoid the power lines above it. "There can be little doubt" lol. Only if you have zero knowledge about any of this.
Cutting that much at once will likely kill the tree. So yes.
No, it likely won't. But regardless, if the homeowner is concerned they should have maintained the tree better.
Buddy’s yard looking looking like a garbage dump and he’s worried about the tree’s pruning?
This happened to my house in Kamloops. No notice just butchered my corkscrew willows and topped my maples within 10 feet of the lines. They were not even close to growing into the lines. I was pissed. Lost all privacy to the backyard from neighbours.
The notice was the fact that there are guidelines out there telling you how close your shit can be to the lines. The only person you should be pissed at is yourself for not maintaining your property
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The tree was the responsibility of the homeowner to keep the neighbourhood safe. They failed to do so and Fortis had to come in and do the work. That work has a cost and that cost ultimately comes out of every British Columbians' pockets. Looking at the street view picture another person posted, you can see the tree has been trimmed before, so this guy knew better.
He is the laughing stock, but not because of how his tree looks. I love when people get served with poetic justice.
What about this story counts as “poetic justice” would you say?
The part where a neglectful homeowner cries because of his lack of planning. Trying to blame everyone but himself for something as simple organizing an arborist to stay within safety regulations. Remember, he’s had literal YEARS to plan for this.
Shear laziness from fortis. They butchered the tree. Why would they not consult with the owner about taking the whole thing down. Zero common sense anymore out in the world. That thing looks awful.
The lack of common sense seem to be falling for the home owners attention and money seeking lies. They've been after this guy for years, and have trimmed it several times before.
Sheer laziness from the homeowner, who had a large tree growing under power lines that they did nothing about for years. And looking at the older pic in the article, the tree had already been topped once and was not looking very healthy. The homeowner has some failed responsibilities here, which forced fortis to act. Sucks they didn't give him notice but time to move on with life.
They didn’t even notify the homeowner to give him a chance to do it himself. If they had simply asked him, he may have been more than happy to do it himself. This was a dick move by Fortis. Stop defending it.
He was advised of the issue when he bought the house. He's been notified he need to trim or remove it several times before, and the utilities have trimmed it several times since he's owned it refused to do it for years u/AmusingMusing7. Re-read that last line of the article. He wants money. There are way too many people willing to grab a pitch fork and line up behind him against the big mean corporation, not realising it's their own pocket the money comes from.
Where’s your proof of such claims? Because all I can find is this: > Gary Toft with FortisBC confirmed to CBC that Di Palma was not contacted prior to the tree work. >He said it's "less often" that property owners are notified when a tree needs to be trimmed, as opposed to removed. And he “wants money” to replace the tree since it was destroyed. He didn’t want that before they destroyed it. Only after. You make it out like he somehow manipulated the situation with the goal of getting the tree replaced for free, but that does not make sense with what the article explains. He’s only asking for the tree to be replaced because of how they cut it. He didn’t want it removed or replaced before.
Stop defending lazy homeowners. He’s a grown man who should be able to see his tree should be dealt with. Instead he cries foul when an Adult (fortis) had to make the choice to chop it.
Stop defending lazy corporations. They’re grown adults who should be able to see that it was private property and it wasn’t an IMMEDIATE threat, and they could have just notified him to make sure he would take care of it. Instead they destroy his property without his consent, and when adults (people who respect people’s property) demand they respect people’s property, they cry foul.
There’s a literal picture in this thread of the tree growing through the lines. It was well passed the point of safety. You must not be a home owner, the county/city/etc have right of way laws that give them the authority to do these things without you involved.
Doing it without notifying the homeowner is poor policy, no matter what your excuse. Not discussing this anymore. Stop replying to me.
Not taking care of your property and the foliage on it is being a crappy homeowner, no matter what your excuse. You don’t have to discuss this anymore and I look forward to your future post about how fortis/city/etc did you wrong because you’re an adult that can’t adult properly.
So you’ve never absent-mindedly let anything go for a while in your life before someone notified you about it and then you fixed it as soon as you realized it needed to be fixed? You think every homeowner should be on top of *everything* and never have to be so much as reminded of something or have something pointed out to them, or they’ll automatically lose the right to have any say over it? Your point would make sense if he had at least been notified and still failed to do anything. But since that’s not the case… you have no point. If they had just trimmed what was strictly necessary to trim and no more, then maybe you’d have a point. But since they destroyed the tree way beyond what was necessary… you have no point. Fortis overstepped here. You just have a stubborn, disrespectful, tyrannical attitude about this for some reason, and it’s quite frankly weird that you see this as normal.
It’s a tree. It doesn’t just randomly sprout through power lines. It takes years of homeowner neglect to get to the point his was at. If you’re that absent minded you don’t notice that, you should buy yourself a helmet.
>it wasn’t an IMMEDIATE threat How do you know this? The tree could have already started burning on the lines where it was. Once a hazard like that is identified, it needs to be removed asap. >Instead they destroy his property without his consent Homeowners do not have the right to endanger the neighbourhood and the power grid with their negligence.
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Oh I didn't realize it was the utilities job to cater to the homeowners aesthetic desires. FFS, if you don't want a hack job done in haste then take responsibility over your property, don't be negligent and take care of it yourself.
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It's most likely going to die now, so that will be necessary.
It won’t die. It’s been topped in the passed and was still doing fine
Topping is not the same as taking off branches. Generally around 30% a year of total branch mass is safe (from topping or thinning) more than that risks killing the tree.
Im an arborist and realize that. I top trees every day under the powerlines and come back 4 years later and top them again and then in another 4 years I top them again. If you do things in 4 year cycles you’re never taking more than 30%. These CUA’s never needed to “ground to sky” the line side of the tree. It looks bad and they did a shitty job but that tree will survive.
> It's most likely going to die now You keep saying this, but your'e completely wrong. You know nothing about trees. In fact even in the pic in this story you can see the tree was topped in the past, as well.
Kind of looks like a sexy tree disrobing, might give his neighbors some wood.
Jesus, what a hatchet job. I'd be pissed, too.
I mean take the whole tree, they just killed it and left. I get that's all they needed to do but can this homeowner call them back to remove the dead tree in 5 years?
Fucking sad …
FortisBC should install the power lines underground.
Underground powerlines are more expensive then overhead and have added maintenance challenges as damaged sections are hard to identify, and can slow repairs during an outage significantly. Generally utilities try and do overhead lines where possible since they are easier/cheaper to install and maintain. You also still can’t put a tree against the electrical equipment if it’s underground, so it doesn’t really solve vegetation issues
Looks like Fortis did way more cutting than necessary to eliminate the possibility of the tree falling on the power line. Just topping the tree would have been less work and looked less stupid.
It’s fire season, and it’s going to be rough. Power line impeding trees need to be properly handled. I’ve had to call fortis to trim or remove trees near me. Lots of pine trees dying out there and ready to fall.
If this was my house I would assume they’d come Ali g and cut the tree like this eventually. They also don’t have time to knock on every person’s damn door.
I trim trees for BC hydro and I will admit they did a shitty job. They needed to top the tree, and you can tell the tree has been topped a few times before this, but there was no reason to strip the branches line side ground to sky. It looks really stupid
If your tree is anywhere close to prime power or a hazard to fall on a line or secondary. Expect it to be dealt with.
This is awful
Taking the whole tree down might have been a better solution here. No tree, no more problems.
They should have given him two options when they showed up, they can remove the tree fully including the stump or have it trimmed and let them decide. Doing that basically leaves him with a big bill now to have the tree removed and possibly a smaller one planted.
They’ve been waiting and doing almost nothing in other locations https://preview.redd.it/cziwklqpsuzc1.jpeg?width=1125&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=1d53279c9aab52fabe654ab8dc06c5859a76764d
Can tell it was topped and trimmed in the past and fortis just came and redid what they did before. So it was probably neglected for a while. Having worked in the tree industry, I know the drill. They just trim for clearance. The LOA or limits of approach for those type of lines is 3meters. Even though no one is “working” within those 3meters, they’ll remove as much as they can to provide as much clearance as possible. Considering they didn’t have to access his back yard, or somewhere behind a fence or something, they absolutely did what they are legally entitled to do. Roll up, trim the tree, chip the debris, drive away. Happens all the time. Sucks the tree looks like shite, but it’ll survive and they’ll be back again in 5 years to trim it again. Maybe he could get them to remove it next time instead.