Mason County, WA Tree Protection: Parkway Planting (2026)

Mason County Code Section 17.23.155 lays out site design standards for downtown Belfair's Mixed Use district, including the pedestrian-walkway network required along Old Belfair Highway, NE Roy Boad Road and the central triangle area bounded by Clifton Way, SR-3 and Old Belfair Highway. Within that framework, a specific planting-strip standard applies where a primary walkway runs alongside driveways or parking lots: street trees on the applicable side must be spaced at least thirty feet on-center, sit in a planting strip providing at least twenty square feet per tree, or alternatively be set within tree grates where a continuous strip is not feasible.

This standard sits alongside companion requirements in the same subsection: pedestrian lighting between twelve and fourteen feet high to achieve two foot-candles on the walkway surface, seating at a rate of one linear foot per thirty square feet of corridor area, and a ban on untreated blank walls facing the walkway. The county's broader Belfair UGA landscaping chapter, Section 17.31, and the parking-lot landscaping standard in Section 17.23.165 impose their own separate tree-spacing ratios for parking buffers along SR-3 and other public streets, so a single Belfair development can face multiple, distinct tree-planting counts depending on whether the frontage in question is a pedestrian walkway, a street-facing parking buffer, or an SR-3 frontage. Mason County's Department of Community Development administers site plan review for these standards under the Belfair UGA design guidelines.