A Northbrook committee recently recommended that one man be allowed to cut down five protected “landmark trees” to build a house and a swimming pool, while recommending denying another man permission to remove a protected tree he said provides shade for mosquitoes to breed.
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The first man, Ross Freeman, will have to pay more than $12,000 to solve his construction-space problems and build his pool, and Muhammad A. Zeeshan, the second man, has been promised $3,500 from the village to help him drain his yard and cut down the mosquito population. Village officials also said Zeeshan has already cut down 17 of the 18 trees in his backyard.
The tree recommendations came in a Northbrook Village Board Public Works Committee session scheduled to handle the two tree protection and preservation ordinance appeals.
Zeeshan, of the 2000 block of Illinois Road, had asked in 2015, and again a few months ago, to cut down a 20-inch-thick American linden tree that stands in the center of his backyard. He was rejected two years ago, and advised to trim, but not cut down, the tree, estimated to be nearly 100 years old. Otherwise, he would have to pay $3,000 —$150 per inch — to take it down. He wanted to cut it down and have the fee waived.
“I cannot allow my child to play in the backyard because of the mosquitoes,” Zeeshan told committee members at a recent session. He said he wants to cut down the tree for more sunlight, and to regrade the whole yard for drainage.
“I’m willing to do whatever can be done, but the tree company says that trimming the tree will basically kill the tree,” he said.
Village arborist Mark Cacioppo agreed that cutting off one or two of the tree’s three big limbs would be likely to kill it, but said that smaller branches could be trimmed to get more light into the yard. Neighbors’ trees could be cut back, too, officials said.
Other Northbrook staff members offered to include Zeeshan’s house on the 50-50 drainage program, with the village paying $3,500 to help build a trench drain that would allow water from his yard to drain into village property beyond his back fence.
Zeeshan said that his backyard flooding problems had been caused by the village giving permits to two adjoining homes, in 1952 and 1967, long before he moved in, to build garages and raise the grade of their properties.
In Freeman’s case, before he walked into the committee meeting, he had already been allowed to remove a 28-inch bur oak suspected to be more than 100 years old, because it was within the almost 23,000 square-foot legal “build-able area” of his 30,000 square foot lot on the 3800 block of Sunset Lane. Another four bur oaks that are 9, 20, 20 and 21 inches thick that are in side yards will also be allowed to come down, plus a 12-inch swamp white oak.
Freedman’s landscape designer, arborist and contractor said that they’d done all they could to plan the construction to get around those trees, and other trees that are expected to survive.
“We’re doing our best to keep as many trees as possible,” Freeman said.
“Most of the people who put in swimming pools clear-cut the trees,” Trustee Bob Israel, committee chairman, said later. “If you want a pool like that, you want to work on your tan.”
But several big trees will be left in the backyard, he said.
“They did a very nice job of working the pool into the back yard without cutting down trees,” Israel said. “(Zeeshan) had come in about a year and a half ago, and requested basically to clear-cut his backyard, and we allowed him to cut down the majority of the trees in the back. He cut down 17 of the 18 trees in the backyard.
“We suggested ways to make his backyard wonderful, but he insisted that the only way to make the backyard wonderful is to cut down the (linden) tree.”
Zeeshan had said that he needed to take down the linden to regrade the backyard for drainage. After that, he would plant trees in two rows along the back fence of his property to make up for all the removed trees – three for those cut previously, and seven for the linden. The new trees would, however, interfere in letting the water drain out of the yard, officials said.
Committee members recommended that he be allowed, at least temporarily, to waive planting the three trees, if he does the drainage work without cutting down the linden, which Cacioppo said is unnecessary. And if he has the linden trimmed, and the problems still persist, he can return for another appeal, Israel said.
The agreement is scheduled for a June 27 vote by the full Northbrook Village Board.
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