Brookhaven, GA Tree Protection: Parkway Planting (2026)

Sec. 14-364 sits in the subdivision street standards of Chapter 14 of the Brookhaven Code. It gives the city arborist, not the applicant, control over what goes into a planting strip: a list of appropriate trees, specifications on spacing, and the appropriate time for planting. No tree off the list can be placed in a planting strip.

The strip itself is set by the street classification table in Sec. 14-353, which has a Planting Strips column. The table prints 2 @ 6' for a parkway, major arterial, minor arterial and residential arterial, 2 @ 5' for a collector, and 2 @ 2' for a local residential street. Sec. 14-354 ties the trees to development: where a subdivision or a project requiring a land development permit fronts an existing street, the applicant shall install all required sidewalks, street trees, streetlights, and place utilities according to the standards in Sec. 14-353.

The credit rules are tightly drawn. Planting-strip trees cannot count toward the front yard tree requirement. They can count toward any remaining density tree requirements under the tree protection ordinance, provided the requirements for tree type for planting strips are met. That credit has real value, because Sec. 14-51 requires all properties within the city to maintain or achieve a minimum tree density of 130 DBH inches per acre and a minimum canopy cover of 45 percent in perpetuity.

The tree article adds its own street tree figures in Sec. 14-57: one overstory tree per 30 linear feet for street tree plantings for LDPs with streetscape improvement requirements, and landscape strips required for overlay street trees must be a minimum of eight feet wide. Because the species list is a closed list, a developer should get the arborist's list, spacing specifications and planting-time guidance before the landscape plan is drawn.