Charleston, SC Tree Protection: Heritage & Protected Trees (2026)

Section 54-326(a) exempts lots of one acre or less zoned RR-1 or SR-1 through SR-8, or used exclusively for single-family or duplex homes, from most of the tree ordinance, but the exemption expressly does not cover grand trees, so the 24-inch rule still applies on a small residential lot. Ordinary 'protected trees' start at 8 inches DBH and face lighter limits: no more than 25 percent may be removed from a parcel within any five-year period, and a minimum of 15 protected trees per acre must remain.

Removing a grand tree itself requires a variance under Section 54-329(b), except for Category III or IV grand trees under Section 54-331, which need only a special exception where the Board finds the tree is in poor health, that saving it would doom a healthier specimen tree, or that it sits within an approved building footprint, street, driveway, drainage way or parking area with no reasonable design alternative. Any building permit application that proposes removing protected trees must include a tree survey overlay under Section 54-328, prepared by a landscape architect, surveyor or engineer registered in South Carolina, accurate to within three feet, showing every protected tree by DBH and species.

Before construction begins, Section 54-330 requires protective barricades: a minimum 10-foot buffer for smaller protected trees, and for grand trees a barricade diameter equal to the tree's DBH in feet, so a 24-inch tree needs a 24-foot-diameter barricade.