Franklin is the Johnson County seat and it has the housing stock you would expect from that: a genuine historic downtown, streets of older homes around Franklin College, and mature trees that have had a century to fill in. The newer subdivisions on the edges of town are a different job entirely.
Most of what we do in Franklin is on established properties, which means working around landscaping that was planted a long time ago and root systems that were there before the driveway was.
Working on established Franklin properties
Mature trees are the defining feature and they cut both ways. They make these streets what they are, and they also mean deep shade, turf competing with tree roots for water, and a fall leaf load that is genuinely a lot of work.
Under a big canopy, grass is never going to be as thick as it is in full sun. Raising the mowing height helps, because a taller blade captures more of the limited light available. What does not help is repeatedly reseeding a spot that will never hold turf. Sometimes the honest answer is that the area wants a bed rather than a lawn, and we would rather say that than sell an annual seeding that fails every year.
The other Franklin constant is landscaping that has outgrown its plan. Foundation plantings put in thirty years ago are now up past the window sills, and the shrubs are usually healthy, just far too big for where they were put. Renovation pruning brings some of them back over two or three seasons. The rest are better taken out and replaced.
Older lots also mean older surface edges. Sidewalks and drives from decades ago have turf grown well over the edge, and cutting a clean line back into them makes a bigger visible difference than almost anything else on the property.
