Troy, NY Landscaping Rules: Tree Removal & Heritage Trees (2026)

Section 251-8 of the Code of the City of Troy sits in Chapter 251, the Public Street Ordinance, and protects trees that stand in public streets. Its one sentence makes it unlawful for any person to cut, mutilate, or in any manner to injure any of the shade or ornamental trees standing in any public street. Removal by cutting is therefore inside the ban, as are lesser harms to a tree.

Three routes lift the prohibition. The first is the consent of the owner of such trees. The second is a direction by the City Council. The third is a direction by the Commissioner of Public Works of the City. A resident, contractor or utility crew with none of the three has no authority under this section to take a street tree down.

The scope is the tree's location. Section 251-8 speaks of trees "standing in any public street." Chapter 251 also defines STREET in § 251-2 as all public streets, avenues, highways, squares, alleys, lanes, public grounds and sidewalks in the City, so the chapter's own vocabulary reaches beyond the roadway. The section prints no application form, fee or permit procedure, and it contains no separate rule for trees on private lots.

Other Troy provisions deal with street trees in different ways. Chapter 271, Complete Streets, lists a Street Tree and Landscape Master Plan among the plans the City will prepare, implement and maintain. The Hoosick Street Overlay Zone District in § 285-66.4 requires street trees on development parcels in that corridor, with spacing, number and species left to the Planning Board.

The Commissioner of Public Works also controls digging in the roadway: § 251-9 requires a permit from the Commissioner for any opening or excavation in or through a public street.