Urban Trees

[tomh009]

From a liability perspective, I appreciate the City's position. If they knowingly allow this, then they open the door for more egregious abuse elsewhere.

I think the City is perfectly entitled to prohibit the behaviour, and there is less risk to the tree, certainly, with this approach. I do think, though, that the liability they are exposed to here is very minimal, and that they could have dealt with this particular situation without needing to outright prohibit the activity. Tapping is done without harming the tree all over the Canada, there's no reason that it couldn't be done safely here as well. We're not dealing with an epidemic of tree tapping in Waterloo, this is a one-off situation that could have been dealt with in a myriad of better ways.

The big problem I have is that this tapping endeavor is a net positive from what I can see both for the individual, but also for the community, but because it's easier to just be heavy handed with the law in individual cases like this, that's what happens. Situations like vehicles parking in bike lanes, which does present a real liability to cyclists, motorists, and the city, is only rarely enforced because more people are affected and it is therefore a more politically costly rule to enforce.

But it is prohibited by the bylaws, so the default action is to enforce the bylaws (bicycle lanes aside for the moment). The best course would have been for the owner to formally request permission from the city. Might or might not work, but the bylaw officer is just enforcing the rules, not making decisions on whether they make sense or not.