Level 1 risk assessment

[matdand]

I have a municipality that have asked me to give them a proposition for risk assessment in three parks, roughly 1100 trees. They have no idea how to go about this, so I was thinking of doing it this way:

- Level 1 walk by assessment with a 360 degree observation of each tree. Note only major defects or areas of concern for safety (decay, conks, fungus, cracks, dead branches, lean, etc.) No notes about tree health or insect/disease problems.

- No recommendations on my part, the muni will decide which trees should be inspected further and we will make them a proposition at that point.

- They are providing inventory info with geolocalisation of each tree.

So, how much time per tree on average? I was thinking 4-5 minutes including prep and documenting/reporting. I kind of tried it out at one of the parks, lots of trees go quickly, then some take a little longer.

4 minutes per = 73 hours
5 minutes per = 92 hours

 

[sotc]

Sounds closer to level 2. Have you taken the TRAQ?

 

[NickfromWI]

You have to be real clear with them on what information they're looking for. We can't talk about 4 vs 5 minutes until we know what we want. I've had large land owners tell me "just tell me about my ten worst trees." I was literally spending 30 seconds a tree and brought them back solid information they were happy with.

But if they want a full paragraph on each tree that's gonna take more time. Maybe they just want a spreadsheet with a 1-10 rating on each tree. That could be 1 minute per tree.

But sometimes they don't know what they want and they need me to spell it out for them. Then I tell them Level 3 every tree!!!


love
nick

 

[matdand]

I did QTRA a few years back and more recently TRAQ.

I did feel they wanted a level two for each tree at first, but that would be ridicously time-consuming, especially for trees with no visible defects.

For the most part I have a green light for the work but they want to budget how much it will cost. I can't give them a rough idea of time without knowing how many trees might need a level 2/3, so I thought I would start with a quick scan of all parks (level 1). It would be easier to estimate this, give them said estimate, then knowing how many trees need further inspection I could estimate more time for level 2/3. The more I think of it the more I think this could probably be done in 2-3 minutes per tree, but I could add a little more for the ''unforseen event''

 

[matdand]

I guess it would be a more thorough level 1 or a quicker level 2, somewhere in the middle.

 

[sotc]

Well it seems you would have to do a level one in order to know which trees to do a level 2 on if they haven't told you.... you need more input from the client I think.