Scranton, PA Invasive Plant Rules: Tree-of-Heaven Removal (2026)

City Code § 423-69A(1)(d) names Ailanthus altissima, the tree of heaven, on Scranton's list of species that shall not be planted within the street right-of-way and shall not be used to meet any city requirement for new land developments and major subdivisions. The tree of heaven is grouped with 11 other prohibited species, including box elder, silver maple, Russian olive, Osage orange, mulberry, poplar, willow, American elm and Siberian elm, all trees the city treats as unsuitable street plantings because of weak wood, invasive root systems or the kind of rapid, weedy growth tree of heaven is known for.

The prohibition is narrow by design: it stops a developer from counting a tree of heaven toward the one-tree-per-60-feet street planting standard, and it keeps the species out of the public right-of-way, but it does not reach a tree of heaven growing on private property that a developer plants in addition to, rather than instead of, the required street trees. Because tree of heaven is also the preferred host of the invasive spotted lanternfly, keeping it out of city-required street plantings has a pest-management payoff beyond the wood and root concerns that drove the original list.

There is no separate citywide removal mandate for existing tree of heaven stands; the rule only bites at the point a subdivision or land development plan proposes planting one.