Worcester, MA Landscaping Rules: Tree Trimming (2026)

Section 21(g), part of the Encroachments section of Chapter Twelve, puts the duty to keep private vegetation off the public way on whoever "causes, allows or maintains" it. The rule covers any growth of shrubs, brush or trees that extends onto or over any portion of a public way, and it specifically calls out "the sidewalk area between the traveled portion of the way and the boundary between the abutting property and the way," meaning the strip most homeowners think of as their own front yard is covered if it borders the sidewalk. The trigger for a violation is impairment: the overgrowth has to extend onto or over the way "so as to impair the safety of pedestrians traveling on the way," language that gives the department room to act on low branches, thorny brush or dense shrubs blocking the walking path without requiring the growth to touch a person first.

This clearance duty is separate from the city's own Public Shade Tree program under Section 28, which controls cutting, trimming or removing trees the city itself owns in the public way. Section 21(g) instead reaches privately owned vegetation that a resident lets grow past the property line and over the sidewalk or street, the more common complaint a resident files when a neighbor's hedge or tree limb has taken over half the sidewalk. Enforcement runs through the commissioner of public works and parks under the department's general superintendence authority in Section 1 of the same chapter.