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Arboricultural Journal
The International Journal of Urban Forestry
ISSN: 0307-1375 (Print) 2168-1074 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/tarb20
Routledge handbook of urban forestry
Ian D. Rotherham
To cite this article: Ian D. Rotherham (2020): Routledge handbook of urban forestry, Arboricultural
Journal, DOI: 10.1080/03071375.2020.1738787
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/03071375.2020.1738787
Published online: 12 Mar 2020.
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2. BOOK REVIEW
Routledge Handbook of Urban Forestry, edited by Francesco Ferrini, Cecil C.
Konijnendijk van den Bosch, and Alessio Fini, 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon,
Oxon OX14 4RN, Routledge, 2017, 574 pp., £170 (hardback); ISBN: 978-1-13-864728-2;
£21 (e-book), £39 (paperback) ISBN: 978-1-31-562710-6
This volume has many positives but also some sig-
nificant shortcomings and disappointments. It is
a major and timely contribution to the literature
which perhaps makes its shortcomings even more
frustrating. In particular, whilst there are excellent
chapters and very good contributions from the UK,
much of the work seems to ignore a lot of good
practice and key research emanating from Britain
and from the Arboricultural Association in particular.
Checking through the reference lists for the chapters
there is an almost total absence of key authors on
things like health and social benefits, on ancient
trees, on urban history, on urban biodiversity (in par-
ticular), and human cultural and social interactions
with urban forests. A big omission since the volume
does include woodlands as opposed to individual
planted trees is the absence of any awareness of archaeology and heritage in the urban forest
landscape or of issues such as encapsulated countryside (e.g. Jones & Rotherham, 2012;
Rackham, 1986; Rotherham & Ardron, 2006; Rotherham, Jones, Smith, & Handley, 2008). In
assessing and managing a woodland site, especially if it is ancient woodland or parkland,
awareness of these matters is essential. In terms of British contributors, the absence of Mark
Johnston, for example, on urban forestry and its practice is unfortunate, and lack of reference
to his key landmark publications is problematic (e.g. Johnston & Rushton, 1999). Similarly, the
British Forestry Commission with authors such as Liz O’Brien has contributed much on health
and social issues but their contributions are similarly neglected. Brian Hibberd’s volume in 1989
was an important reflection of the emerging interest at that time (Hibberd, 1989) but again the
British influence seems to be overlooked.
A context for the book, and why the volume is so important, is that over half the world’s
population now lives in cities. Creating sustainable, healthy and aesthetic urban environ-
ments is therefore a major policy goal and research agenda. This handbook aims to provide
a comprehensive global overview of the state-of-the-art practice and science of urban
forestry, and so is a timely contribution to the literature. It is published at a time when
the field of urban forestry is thriving at least in some countries, where it is increasingly
needed in all, and where research, practice and education are under continuous develop-
ment. However, it would have been good to see more on the challenges facing professional
tree practice in less favourable situations and an emphasis on the need to strengthen
support, training, and dissemination in those areas too.
This rise in the importance of urban forestry is reflected, for example, in the rapid growth
of journals such as Urban Forestry and Urban Greening and the Arboricultural Journal, which
Arboricultural Journal
3. nowadays have increasing numbers of research and review paper submissions each year. The
growth and maturation of the field is further evidenced by numbers of international,
national, and local conferences, seminars and workshops focusing specifically on urban
forestry. Whilst the editors have noted how the International Society of Arboriculture (ISA)
and the International Union of Forest Research Organisations (IUFRO), have provided leader-
ship in many areas, the key role of the Arboricultural Association (AA) itself over 50 years old
appears to be overlooked at least in the cover blurb. To me, this reflects a weakness in the
focus and choice or omission of some contributions. For a UK reader, this will seem to be
a rather mixed bag with excellent and important chapters and others that leave you very
frustrated. The final chapter on “Urban woodlands and their management”, for example,
overlooks entirely much of the key literature and appears to present no awareness of the
importance of landscape history and associated heritage in such sites. Furthermore, the
issues of cultural severance and formerly “worked” trees such as coppices and pollards are
woefully neglected by many of the contributions. This is not a criticism of the chapter itself
and what is presented in it, but of “what is not there”. This title suggests “management” is
the theme but you cannot and should not manage ancient urban woodland in the absence
of knowledge of its cultural heritage, archaeology, worked trees, and indicator plants. This is
really quite basic stuff. The situation is saved to some extent by the excellent chapter from
Neville Fay and Jill Butler on “Ancient and other veteran trees”. Even here though, there is
little on what these ancient trees mean in terms of their surrounding landscape in which they
are rooted and the sensitivity of the associated archaeology, soils, and indicator plants.
The cover information continues with the valid recognition that in Europe, the annual
European Forum on Urban Forestry (EFUF) has a history of around 20 years. This provides
a platform for urban forestry practitioners and academics from Europe and elsewhere to
meet. I find it frustrating that the key annual meetings of the Arboricultural Association are
not similarly acknowledged, and neither are those of the Ancient Tree Forum or of Treeworks
for example. This feels like a major oversight which further affects the coverage and focus of
the volume. Perhaps a problem is that the scope and range of “urban forestry” is now so
broad that it is hard to cover it effectively in a single, albeit very large, volume. This also
means that there are, I think, some serious oversights that I will return to later.
It is noted that as urban forestry keeps developing rapidly and there is a need for
comprehensive, state-of-the-art publications that provide guidance to students and experts
through the growing forest of studies and practices. Taking a global perspective on urban
forestry, this handbook aims to fulfil part of this need, with the following objectives:
● To stimulate interest in the multiple roles and benefits of urban green areas.
● To provide insights about the multiple stresses experienced by trees in cities. This
also relates to details about tolerance mechanisms of species with validated and
potential ornamental use, as well as to cultural techniques for either pre-
conditioning plants in the nursery or alleviating stresses after planting.
● To promote sound planning, design, establishment and management of urban
trees and urban forests for the optimisation of their benefits is the domain of the
fields of arboriculture and urban forestry. These fields draw upon a wide range of
disciplines and have generated a large amount of knowledge and good practice
during the past decades. Close interactions with the local urban communities who
benefit from trees – and in some cases also are affected by tree disservices – are
key to successful arboriculture and urban forestry.
2 Book Review
4. The volume says that it draws on international state-of-the-art knowledge on urban forestry
and urban arboriculture, so the book provides a comprehensive overview of the current state
of the field. This is done but with the exclusions as noted already. The book intends to be an
essential handbook for researchers, students and practitioners dealing with urban trees in
one way or another and this aspiration and the opportunity it gives for a more joined-up
approach is my primary frustration with the final product. The handbook does provide
a unique perspective by having the tree and its growing site in focus, looking at biotic,
abiotic and anthropogenic interactions between tree and environment. The absence of some
of the essential insights is therefore particularly annoying.
However, the volume does describe the multiple roles and benefits of urban green areas
in general and the specific role of trees, including for issues such as air quality, human well-
being and stormwater management. Importantly, it reviews the various stresses experienced
by trees in cities and tolerance mechanisms, as well as cultural techniques for either pre-
conditioning or alleviating stress after planting. Chapters by Simson, by Kim, and by scholars
and practitioners like Henrik Sjöman, Glynn Percival, and Philip van Wassenaer are excellent
contributions, and indeed there is much good stuff here. The book, for example, helps set out
sound planning, design, species selection, establishment and management of urban trees.
Nevertheless, whilst it shows that close interactions with the local urban communities who
benefit from trees are the key to success, with much excellent work on community practice,
the links to countryside management professionals, a professional group often very involved
in urban forestry, seems to be missed entirely. Furthermore, the impacts of politics and
imposed austerity measures on such professionals as local authority ecologists, archaeolo-
gists, tree officers, parks departments, woodland officers, and countryside services are well-
documented (e.g. Rotherham, 2015) and have profound implications for the urban forest and
not just in the UK.
The other notable omission in the volume is that it does not really engage with urban
ecology, and in the relevant chapters I could not find reference to the great luminaries on the
subject such as the late Oliver Gilbert (Gilbert, 1989), or even David Goode (Goode, 2014).
Furthermore, there is little awareness of the unique ecological dynamic of urban habitats and
their “recombinant communities” (e.g. Rotherham, 2017), on invasive and non-native species
(e.g. Rotherham & Lambert, 2011), or on the growing global field of “novel ecologies”. This
may seem to be nit-picking, but it combines to mean a major opportunity has been in part
missed. There is much in the volume which is good and will stand the test of time. By
drawing upon international state-of-the-art knowledge on arboriculture and urban forestry,
the book provides a broad but selective overview of the field and is an important text for
students, researchers and practitioners. Of course, the reader will probably guess what comes
next which is that the exorbitant price of the hardback is most unfortunate. My particular
view is that prices should reduce and sales would increase to balance that. As an author, the
main aspiration is that people read your work, and this sort of price prevents that. The
paperback, however, is much more accessible.
The volume editors are Francesco Ferrini, Dean of the School of Agriculture and Professor of
Arboriculture, University of Florence, Italy, Cecil C. Konijnendijk van den Bosch, Professor of
Urban Forestry, University of British Columbia, Canada, and Alessio Fini, researcher, Department
of Production and Agri-Environment, University of Florence, Italy.
References
Gilbert, O. L. (1989). The ecology of urban habitats. London: Chapman and Hall.
Goode, D. (2014). Nature in towns and cities. London: Collins New Naturalist.
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