Queenstown Lakes District Council parks manager Gordon Bailey, deputy mayor Lyal Cocks, and Stoney Creek resident Alan Chisholm, who heavily pruned several trees near his house on Old Station Ave, met last week.
The council had earlier said the pruning was "vandalism" and prosecution was a possibility.
Mr Chisholm said the trees should never have been planted in the subdivision as they could grow to an unknown size and their "huge" root system would cause "immeasurable damage".
Already, the roots had lifted a concrete slab on his neighbour's driveway, and those growing near a high voltage power box in the street had been identified as a safety hazard by Delta.
The council agreed he could remove the trees and replace them with smaller cherry trees "which will not grow to the astronomical proportions that these [existing trees] Prunus avium plena were destined to grow to", Mr Chisholm said.
Mr Bailey said the existing trees would have been signed off by a landscape architect when the subdivision was consented.
"But people have their own perceptions about what's appropriate and what's inappropriate."
He confirmed Mr Chisholm had escaped prosecution "at this stage" and said the resolution reached was a "sensible" one. However, Mr Chisholm's actions were "definitely the wrong way to go about it".
People should always contact the council first before taking any issues with the district's 8000 council-owned street trees into their own hands.
"And hopefully we can reach a mutual agreement and that's what's happened in every other case in the district."
Mr Bailey said the council had fielded eight complaints from people about the tree-pruning, as the trees were valued by "a lot" of people.
To those people, Mr Chisholm said "we all like things that grow, but if they're in the wrong place we've got no option but to remove them and put a suitable species in".
