A lot will depend on how tall the tree is, what it's diameter is and will they need to climb or use a bucket lift in order to take it down in pieces, or will they be able to drop the whole tree and then cut it up.
Also, your location can drive high or low labor rates.
If it's too big for the city to handle and dropping big branches, I doubt that it will be cheap.

It's about 30' high and wide. I don't expect it to be cheap, in any case.

We had a 30'-40' tall tree taken down. It was causing foundation issues with it's roots and was close enough that we feared falling branches doing damage. It cost us about $1500 in my low cost labor area for the whole insured crew to take care of it safely. They used a bucket and the electric chain saw and had to rig the takedown in stages with cables to lower pieces. That didn't include stump grinding. They went ahead and took another tree down while they were here (they were FAST!) and it only cost $100 because it wasn't close to anything and could just be felled and cut up---and they were already on site. It's the expense of the trip charge with the initial workers that's the biggie. If you have other work that needs doing, you'd probably get a better "bundle" deal than just doing a lone tree.

Hi.
I had a large pine tree removed about 20 or 30 feet tall between two buildings last summer. Cost 800.00 no stump removal. This was in Northren Ca. Get a couple bids.
Check with your city they could cause grief.
Good Luck Woodbutcher

so what would happen if it fell into the street..
maybe by some cutting at the base? or rotting at the base? now a city problem.which it should be anyway..is the tree in in your yard of the city right of way for the street?

sure this doesn't take care of the stump..but most of the tree is gone and not going to fall on something

Yeah and if the tree fell on a car or fell the other way onto the house, it would be up to the OP to pay for the damage personally. No insurance will cover something diagnosed as a hazard.

Perhaps you should reconsider taking the whole tree down. Maybe a severe pruning could eliminate most risk of branches falling, spare the tree, and save the cost of a stump grinding.

In one city near here, the city claims to own ANYTHING planted between the street and the sidewalk. Better be sure that you have permission to cut that tree.

Is it near power lines? If so, contact your electric company and get their advice. In the past when we have had a tree near the road that has been known to drop major limbs, the electric company has had a tree company come out to either remove the tree or at least remove the limbs that may fall in the future. Of course this only applies if your electric lines are not buried.

When we had a major ice storm back in 2005, a huge 100 year old oak owned by the city fell on my parents home.

The city refused to pay for the damage and my parents home insurance had to pay for the repairs.

I know this is an old post, but what was the outcome? Did you have it taken down successfully at an agreeable cost, or is it still standing?

"When we had a major ice storm back in 2005, a huge 100 year old oak owned by the city fell on my parents home.

The city refused to pay for the damage and my parents home insurance had to pay for the repairs. "

Generally, unless a tree was previously known to be at risk, if a tree falls on an adjacent lot and causes damage the tree's owner is not liable - nothing to do with whether it was on city property or private property.

This post was edited by saltidawg on Mon, May 19, 14 at 20:02

Yep, we had 100-mph straight line winds here several years ago, and a neighbor's tree took out our fence. Once the tree landed in our yard, it became our tree, and our insurance paid to fix the fence.

We worked together with the neighbors to remove the tree.