← All guides · Rules & paperwork · Updated July 2026

Four conservation areas, one six-week notice, and one £20,000 fine.

If your Broadstairs garden sits inside one of the town's four conservation areas, Thanet District Council's tree rules pick up where ordinary garden law leaves off. Part of Broadstairs' older core is inside a CA, and many homeowners don't know it. Here is the short version of what it actually means for hedge work, and the shorter list of what it doesn't.

Conservation areas have been a fixture in English planning law since the Civic Amenities Act 1967. They protect the look and feel of an area, not just individual buildings, which is why the rules sweep up trees as well as bricks. Thanet District Council looks after four of them in Broadstairs:

Broadstairs Conservation Area: originally designated 5 June 1970. Extended on 21 October 1986, and again to the north and south on 23 July 2009.
St Peter's Conservation Area: designated 13 April 1973.
Reading Street Conservation Area: designated 13 April 1973.
Kingsgate Conservation Area: designated 13 April 1973.

Two things worth knowing about that list. First, not every part of Broadstairs is inside one: a neighbourhood can be partly in and partly out, so check the specific address rather than assuming. Second, if you are unsure whether your address is in one, the Thanet District Council conservation area location tool is the authoritative answer. Search your postcode on the council's website; if your plot falls inside a CA boundary, you are in.

The actual rule, in plain English

Inside a conservation area, you must give Thanet District Council six weeks' written notice before you can prune, lop, top or fell any tree with a stem over 75mm in diameter measured at 1.5 metres from the ground. This is set out in section 211 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, hence the "s.211 notice" contractors mention.

The council has six weeks from receipt of your notice to either do nothing (in which case you can proceed) or to make a formal Tree Preservation Order on the tree (in which case a separate consent application is needed). The council cannot refuse a notice; it can only respond by making a TPO. If no TPO is made, you can carry out the work within two years of giving the notice.

What does 75mm at 1.5m actually look like?

About the diameter of a half-litre water bottle, measured at chest height. A thick holm oak or a mature yew standard clipped into a hedge for decades almost certainly qualifies. A privet stem in the body of a young hedge almost certainly doesn't. Multiple stems in a single hedge, each measured separately at 1.5m, can collectively push you over the line. Always worth a tape measure before a quote.

The £20,000 fine

The reason this matters: unauthorised works to a protected tree in a conservation area (or a TPO tree anywhere in Thanet) is a criminal offence, with a fine of up to £20,000 in the magistrates' court and an unlimited fine in the Crown Court.

Older gardens often contain a mature holm oak, yew or holly standard grown up inside a working hedge line. It can look like part of the hedge. It is not: it is an individual tree, and if its trunk is over the 75mm threshold, reducing it as part of a hedge cut without giving a notice is an offence.

What's exempt

Plenty, actually. The exemption list is what makes most routine hedge cutting in Broadstairs fall outside the rule.

Hedging-species cutting. Hedges and shrubs are normally not covered by the s.211 rules, so trimming a privet, laurel, Escallonia, Griselinia, Olearia, Euonymus or Elaeagnus hedge does not normally need a notice, even in a conservation area. The rule targets trees, and a tree growing in a hedge can be caught.
Stems under 75mm. Young hedges, formative cuts, anything where the largest individual stem is below the threshold.
Dead or dangerous trees. GOV.UK guidance says that for a dead tree you give the council five working days' written notice before the work starts, with evidence that it is dead. Where a tree presents an immediate danger you can do what is needed and tell the council as soon as practicable afterwards. A replacement tree is required if one is removed as dead or dangerous. Check with Thanet District Council if you are unsure.
Fruit trees cultivated for fruit. Fruit trees cultivated for their fruit can be exempt. An ornamental or old garden apple tree is not automatically exempt, so ask the council.

What this means in practice for most Broadstairs hedge jobs: the notice does not apply. A routine Escallonia, Griselinia, laurel, privet or Leylandii hedge cut in a conservation area normally falls outside it. The notice catches the awkward cases: a holm oak grown up within an old hedge, a mature yew at the corner of a garden, a holly standard in the middle of a boundary hedge.

The hidden traps

Three things catch people out.

Mature standards inside a hedge line. Some older hedges have one or two big trees grown up inside them: holm oak, yew, holly, occasionally an old sycamore. They look like part of the hedge but they are individual trees, and over the 75mm threshold they are covered. Reduce one of those as part of a hedge cut without giving a notice, and it is an offence. Fine: up to £20,000 in the magistrates' court.

TPO trees mixed into hedges. Separate to conservation areas, individual TPOs can apply anywhere in Thanet. They show on the council's mapping. If a hedge line includes a TPO tree, that tree needs full consent (not just a notice), and the rest of the hedge work has to be planned around it.

Listed building curtilage. If the property is listed (Grade I, II* or II), walls, gate piers and other structures within its curtilage may be protected too. Altering or removing them can need Listed Building Consent, so check with the council before changing a boundary. Trimming the hedge itself does not need consent.

The High Hedges route

Different rule, worth mentioning. Under Part 8 of the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003, if an evergreen or semi-evergreen hedge over 2 metres is causing a neighbour a reasonable loss of light or amenity, and they have tried and failed to resolve it with you first, they can lodge a formal complaint with Thanet District Council. TDC's fee for investigating the complaint is £650. If TDC finds in the complainant's favour, it can issue a remedial notice setting out the work and a deadline; failing to carry it out is an offence with a fine of up to £1,000 on prosecution. Tall mature laurel and Leylandii screens are the usual subject of these complaints.

How I handle it

Before I quote any conservation-area job, I check three things:

The Thanet District Council mapping tools: is the property inside one of the four CAs, and are there any individual TPOs on the plot?
The hedge line: any stems over 75mm at chest height that would need a notice?
The property: listed building? Any wall/gate/railing work that would trigger LBC?

If a notice is needed, I help you prepare it: a description of the work, a sketch of the hedge and the contractor details. There is no fee for the notice, and the work goes ahead once the six weeks have passed without a TPO. If a TPO consent application is needed instead, that is a longer process (the council has eight weeks, and there is no application fee); I'll flag it in the quote so you can decide whether to proceed.

Not sure if your address is in a CA?

Send your postcode to hello@broadstairshedges.co.uk or call 07763 100 477. I'll check the council's conservation area tool and tell you whether the notice applies before you commit to anything. No charge for the check.

Sources: Town and Country Planning Act 1990, section 211; Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003, Part 8; Thanet District Council conservation area designation dates (Broadstairs CA 5 June 1970, extended 21 October 1986 and 23 July 2009; St Peter's, Reading Street and Kingsgate CAs 13 April 1973); GOV.UK trees in conservation areas guidance; TDC works to protected trees and high hedges pages.

Received a notice from the council? Read what to do if you receive a section 154 notice.