Industry Comment: HTA


Industry bodies agree on a unified approach to support a new landscaping standard


Leading landscape and garden design organisations have come together to agree a coordinated, industry-wide approach to supporting the implementation of the new British Standard BS 7533-102, following a meeting hosted by the HTA.


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epresentatives from the HTA’s Association of Professional Landscapers (APL), the British


Association of Landscape Industries (BALI), the Landscape Institute (LI) and the Society of Garden and Landscape Designers (SGLD) met at Horticulture House to discuss how the industry can work together to help members, educators and the wider landscape sector understand and adopt the Standard effectively. Launched in March 2025, BS 7533-102


represents a significant milestone for landscape and garden construction. For the first time, the Standard includes traffic categories 1-3, making it directly applicable to areas such as pathways, patios, residential driveways, and


parking bays, covering a wide range of settings, from domestic gardens to extensive networks delivered and maintained by local authorities, highways, and public spaces. The meeting between leading garden, landscape and design organisations focused on developing a shared, practical approach to implementation that reflects the realities of the sector. In particular, discussions explored how guidance could cover the whole process from design and specification through to construction and delivery, and how this could be aligned across organisations to support consistency, training and education. It was agreed that, as first steps, the industry should recognise BS 7533-101 and BS 7533- 102 as benchmarks for landscape design and construction and use them to explore the


PRODUCT NEWS


Above: (L-R) Phil Tremayne - General Manager of the APL, Wayne Grills - Chief Executive of BALI, Tracy Whitfield - Technical & Research Manager for the Landscape Institute and John Wyer - Vice Chair of the Society of Garden and


development of a shared industry Code of Practice or Best Practice framework. It was also agreed that the group should prioritise education as the primary route to achieving industry-wide adoption.


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