London Plane is the most commonly grown street tree in the San Francisco Bay Area, probably because it is tolerant of urban conditions and usually develops a strong branch structure.  It is a deciduous hybrid of two Platanus species (one from North America and one from Asia).  Its leaves are shaped like maple leaves and its bark is dappled in shades of gray. It is widely planted in Europe (the Avenue des Champs-Elysees in Paris is lined on both sides with them). In San Francisco you can see pollarded specimens near the Band Shell in Golden Gate Park and along many streets.

This is a tree that can grow to great age and immense proportions. There are many large and beautiful  specimens in Larkspur, but all of them have outgrown their sidewalk planting sites. Hopefully, accommodation can be made for the trees in the future as their trunks continue to enlarge.

If the trees in the lower photo are the same as the ones in the upper photo (from Larkspur Past and Present 2010) it means they are around 90 years old. The trees are large but have lost their natural shape due to a now discredited arboricultural practice called “topping” intended to reduce the height of trees. Notice that the trees in the bottom photo have large lateral branches that originate from the same point (where they were topped) but the trees in the top photo have lateral branches that are alternately and radially spaced along the trunk.