Tree Service in River Grove, IL

River Grove has a rule we have not seen anywhere else in Cook County. Section 3-6-15, as amended by Ordinance 2019-06, covers trees the village orders you to remove. If that tree stands over sixteen feet tall, you must secure the services of a licensed arborist. The same applies if the work crosses onto a neighbor’s property. Not a handyman, not a friend with a chainsaw. That one clause sets the floor for tree service River Grove homeowners can lawfully buy.

Sixteen feet is not a big tree. That threshold catches most of what people would otherwise attempt themselves.

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The Rest Of Chapter 6

River Grove runs forestry properly for a village of 10,600. Section 3-6-1 establishes a Village Tree Board of at least five resident members. Section 3-6-5 creates a Division of Forestry. It handles planting, trimming, spraying, removal and maintenance of all trees, weeds, plants and shrubs on public areas. Under 3-6-12, the village may plant, prune, maintain and remove within all streets, alleys and public areas. Adjacent owners may still plant street trees, so long as they comply with the chapter.

Section 3-6-8 restricts parkway species to the approved list without the Tree Board’s written permission. The banned list at 3-6-9 is long. It covers box elder, cottonwood, silver maple, tree of heaven, catalpa, mulberry, poplar (other than tulip tree) and willows. It also covers Siberian and Chinese elms, all fruit-bearing types, and conifers that restrict vision. Clearance comes from 3-6-14: ten feet above the street, eight feet above the sidewalk.

A Village Named For Its Ash Trees

The name comes from the Des Plaines River and from the groves of American ash that lined the bottomland. The emerald ash borer took those between roughly 2006 and 2018. University of Illinois Extension has documented the spread since the beetle reached the state. Lafromboise Woods held Cook County’s second-oldest green ash on record, estimated at 240 years.

What does that mean for a homeowner here? An ash still standing survived a wave that took nearly everything around it. So it deserves an honest look rather than an automatic removal. If it is dead, it is now brittle. Brittle dead ash is one of the more dangerous trees to take down. That is a large part of why the village wrote the sixteen-foot arborist rule.

Bottomland, Forest Preserve, And Repeated Flooding

Roughly half the community is forest preserve — about 350 acres. The Des Plaines River runs through it, shallow and muddy, over what the village describes as bottomland. There are 334 acres in the 100-year floodplain and 416 in the 500-year. Flooding recurs at Grand and River Road, and at Fullerton and River Road. Both become impassable.

Trees on bottomland root shallow because they never have to go deep for water. Shallow roots, saturated ground and a west wind. That is the whole story of most failures we see on this side of the river. It is also why tree service River Grove buys tends to be urgent rather than planned.

Tree Service River Grove: What We Do

• Removals, including dead ash — the brittle ones that need rigging rather than climbing
• Pruning to the ten-foot street and eight-foot sidewalk clearances Section 3-6-14 requires
• Stump grinding
• Clearing along the forest preserve boundary lines
• Storm response, day or night

Estimating Tree Service River Grove

Address, and roughly how tall the tree is. If it stands over sixteen feet and you have had a notice, the ordinance already decided you need a licensed crew. We will just tell you what it costs.

708-424-5885 · Cook County service area · nearby: Elmwood Park, Franklin Park.