More than 50 trees are being felled on a housing estate to reduce damage to houses, walls and pavements.

The trees, planted in a series of landscape schemes in the 1960s, are causing chaos by cracking walls, raising pavements and undermining properties on Witham's Templars Estate.

Now, faced with an increasing number of insurance claims and concerns about the risk to pedestrians, landscape experts from Braintree Council have decided they need to be chopped down.

The felling of the trees, mainly maple and wild cherry, will take place some time next week.

District councillor Robert Evans, whose Witham North ward includes the estate, said: "One of the challenges for the community is to consider what can be done, area by area, to provide alternative planting or landscaping where the trees have been removed.

"The way the estate was designed offers the possibility for different kinds of local planting to give local variation."

For similar reasons, Essex County Council is planning to remove six other trees on the estate. But Green Party councillor James Abbott described the move as "alarming".

He said: "While I accept some trees have grown too close to buildings, there are others which I see no justification for chopping down.

"I have no problem with a tree being cut down if it's causing a genuine problem, but in the past Braintree Council has often gone over the top in removing trees when it's not always necessary."

Melvyne Crow, Braintree Council's land and countryside manager, said: "Some may see this as a negative move, but we are only taking action in areas where there is a very real risk of further damage."

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.