Aged care and retirement living sites concentrate three things that push tree risk upward at the same time: mature landscaped grounds, high daily occupancy of outdoor areas, and residents who cannot move quickly. The third is the one that does not appear in a standard grounds report, and it is the one that changes the risk calculation most.
Why occupancy is the driver
QTRA quantifies risk from three inputs: the target, the size of the part that could fail, and the probability of failure. On a typical residential block, target occupancy is low — a back yard used a few hours a week. On an aged care site, the equivalent space is a courtyard used by residents and staff for most of the daylight hours, every day.
The tree does not change. The risk of harm does, sometimes by an order of magnitude, purely because of who is underneath it and how often. Two identical trees on two sites can sit on opposite sides of a tolerability threshold for that reason alone.
QTRA's target input accounts for occupancy, not mobility. A resident using a walker cannot clear a falling limb the way a fit adult might. That does not change the calculated probability of a strike, but it should inform how conservatively the result is acted on — and it belongs in the reasoning recorded alongside the number.
The duties that apply
An aged care provider is a person conducting a business or undertaking. Section 19(1) of the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (Qld) covers staff — care workers, kitchen staff, gardeners, contractors. Section 19(2) covers “other persons”, which is residents, families and visitors. Section 19(3)(a) requires the provision and maintenance of a work environment without risks to health and safety, and the grounds are part of that environment.
Retirement villages operating under a body corporate structure carry the additional duty in section 152 of the Body Corporate and Community Management Act 1997 (Qld) to maintain common property in good condition.
What a court has said is reasonable
The clearest recent benchmark comes from outside aged care. In November 2024 a Victorian holiday park operator was fined $475,000 after a falling branch killed a camper. The jury found annual arborist assessment, and acting on the recommendations, was reasonably practicable. The operator had no documented inspection system and had not had a general assessment since 2015.
A holiday park and a retirement village are not identical, but the risk profile of an aged care site is worse on every input that matters: higher daily occupancy of outdoor areas, longer dwell times, and a resident population less able to avoid a falling limb. It is difficult to argue that an annual documented assessment is reasonably practicable for a caravan park but not for a residential aged care facility.
Where the risk concentrates on these sites
- Courtyards, garden seating and shade structures — designed for long dwell times, usually placed deliberately under the biggest trees
- Pathways and mobility routes between buildings, where residents cannot easily divert
- Bus pick-up points and visitor parking
- Smoking areas, which are almost always outdoors and under cover of trees
- Staff amenity areas
- Independent living unit driveways and carports
What to put in place
- A documented tree inspection policy naming the method, the assessor's qualification and the cycle. Fold it into the existing WHS management system rather than running it separately.
- A tree register with a quantified risk of harm per tree, mapped to the site plan.
- Occupancy recorded as an input, so the reasoning is visible — and re-assessed when a courtyard is refurbished or a path is rerouted.
- A prioritised action list with completion evidence.
- Post-storm re-inspection as a standing trigger, not an ad hoc decision.