I'd recommend: Junierpus chinensis 'Blue Arrow'/could be species: virginiana Thuja occidentalis 'Degroot's Spire' You don't want Juniperus scopulorum because of disease issues. Juniperus communis will fair fine. Pinus strobus 'Fastigiata' is way too large of a tree. The verdict on 'Stowe Pillar' isn't known yet, however, it will not stop growing and will become very tall during its' life course. Dax

Example Here south of Chicago i have some potted plants including hardy chicago but i bring them in attached garage for the winter. They do fine . Martin

Sorry for my delays in responding. The need auto be about 8 feet from the road (I think range is 5-10 or so). We can plant any variety and I think we can mix or do whatever as long as they are from the list. I do not know the ph or soil type. I do know there are many rocks in the land here (when we excavated there were many large boulders). I do not have a landscape plan in place yet. They have told us we need to plant 6 trees, but for symmetry I think 5 would look so much better so I am going to approach them today and see if we can do that. Below is where I was thinking of putting them. They are supposed to be every 35 feet but I think there might be some flexibility due to driveways and things. its the let me do what I want, there would be a gap larger than 35' between the left and right of the drive (each box is 10' if you enlarge the picture). We have already planted October Glory Maple and Princeton Elm in the backyard (we wanted trees that would grow quickly so we can get some shade sooner than later).

Does your road ever get plowed to clear snow in winter? Ever get salted? If the answer to either question is yes, you don't want shrubs, especially evergreens like boxwood between the road and the fence. Also, how much room is there? I am not entirely sure that there is room for boxwoods in that spot unless you want to learn how to shear them when they start to get larger a few years down the road. Do folks ever park along the road? If yes, how would a passenger get out of the car? While what you have there may have gotten weedy and out of control, there may be other perennials that will do well there if you plant just a couple of types of hardy, dense-growing perennials such as one of the groundcover perennial geraniums. Regardless of what you have there, it will need something for weed control, but which plants you choose may increase or reduce the amount of weeding. The easiest is grass since all you have to do is mow and weed whack along the fence. Dense growing perennials of just one or two kinds might work. If no snow, some densely growing shrubs might work if well-mulched. Regardless, anything other than grass will need some weeding, at least for a while until it fills in, and even then will need some a few times annually based on my experience. For your backyard, are you interested in tall deciduous trees or evergreens, or do you want shrubs? Or some tall and some shorter plants? Is it more that you don't want to see all of the neighbors' yard or just all of the fence? Do you want year round coverage or is that not important?