BRANCHING BEYOND

Date: 2023-24

Funder: Natural Environment Research Council; Arts and Humanities Research Council

Partners: Aberystwyth University; Forest Research; Open University; Stockholm Environment Institute (York); University of York

Value: £82,000

New routes for impacting policy around the social and cultural values of urban trees.

Building upon the work of Branching Out, Branching Beyond (2023-2024) will package up the Branching Out values framework, approach, and results in a user-friendly online values porting template aimed at local government planners, tree officers, voluntary organisations and community groups. Initially compiling results from the three Branching Out case cities (Milton Keynes, Cardiff and York), Branching Beyond will develop a rapid assessment approach to ‘horizontally port’ these results to two replicator cities: Edinburgh and Camden (London).

We will package up the qualitative associations between treescape characteristics and social and cultural values previously identified through storytelling, mapping, and deliberation, and work with our local authority partners and the Local Government Association to develop training for local authorities and third sector and community groups.