In the battle for sidewalks in NYC, tree beds are the smallest boundary

More than 660,000 trees line the streets of New York City, and the beds surrounding them cover over 400 acres, according to the city’s estimate. While many people simply walk past the rectangular openings in the sidewalk where the trees emerge—or, worse, use the spaces as trash cans and dog toilets—others, unofficially, lay claim to these pocket-sized plots of land.

As the weather warms up, these caregivers are springing into action.

They plant flowers, place signs to deter dog owners and make fences from broomsticks, linoleum tiles and old skateboards. Some create mini-memorials for deceased loved ones.

It all makes sense. In a concrete jungle where few residents have a garden, the small plots offer New Yorkers a rare opportunity to dig into the ground, connect with nature and grow something beautiful.

“The treebed is the unsung hero of the urban forest,” says Andrea Parker, executive director of the Gowanus Canal Conservancy, who “ambassadors” in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn, who watch over young trees and fill their beds with native plants. “If we are going to build a robust tree canopy for the city, we have to think about the ground and take care of the ground.”

However, not everyone is fascinated by such ad hoc acts of stewardship. After fencing was erected around a tree on the Upper East Side not long ago, a man ripped it out to make it easier for his dog to relieve himself. He was taken to court.

It must be said that dog pee and poop can be harmful to plants, not to mention creating hazards for those who till the soil.

Street trees are the property of the city, even if they are planted by a private individual or building owner. They fall under the jurisdiction of the Parks Department, which provides leadership tree bed care workshops and has increased planting, especially in poor neighborhoods. It added almost 15,000 street trees during fiscal year 2023, while district presidents, Local council members and non-profit groups have called for more.

During planting, the department increased the size of the tree beds, previously no more than 5 by 5 feet, but now often 5 by 10 or even longer; the more spacious accommodations allow roots to spread and can absorb more rainwater.

With rising temperatures and more frequent, intense storms due to climate change, street trees have become increasingly important: they provide shade, lower ambient temperaturesabsorb carbon dioxide and produce oxygen.

Tree beds can also become personal.

Elijah V. Irvin grew up on West 150th Street in Hamilton Heights. As a boy he ran back and forth a community garden in his neighborhood, taking a particular interest in a Japanese zelkova tree near Broadway, said Signe Mortensen, a neighbor involved in maintaining the garden and tree beds.

“He was very curious, smart and shy,” she said.

As he got older, Elijah got into computers and drill rap. He had gained fame with it music videos he made under the name Edot Baby when he died unexpectedly two years ago at the age of 17.

Beside themselves with grief, his family and friends turned the bed around his favorite tree into a memorial, built a wooden fence and wrote messages and his lyrics on it. Someone sprayed hearts.

Elijah’s mother, Tanya Gabriel, sometimes sits nearby.

“Every time I pass by, I think of him,” she said.

In some neighborhoods, groups have formed to care for the street trees and their small plots of land.

Elena Petkova-Schulze started planting bulbs from the Daffodil project in tree beds on West 119th Street in Harlem in 2018, only to find out someone else in her neighborhood was doing the same thing. Now there are 85 people in a WhatsApp group for the area, and they have a tree bed map and a spreadsheet where they monitor the condition of the trees.

The Jackson Heights Beautification Group has a volunteer team called Tree LC, which meets weekly in Queens. On a recent Saturday morning, some people trimmed trees while others removed trash from beds on 37th Avenue, a busy commercial street nearby. Then they met again in a cafe for lunch.

“It’s also a social event,” said Len Maniace, the group’s organizer.

Some people decorate tree beds with pink flamingos, planters, hand-painted rocks and, less whimsically, bait stations made of boxy black plastic or shaped like gray rocks – intended for the rats that sometimes leave gaping holes in the dirt after tunneling out of the ground . underground caves. The bait stations don’t yield much, experts say.

“It’s just something buildings do to pretend they’re addressing the problem,” said Samuel A. Bishop II, director of education at the nonprofit Trees New York, which has created popular “Citizen pruner” lessons..

Julie Menin, a council member on Manhattan’s East Side, is trying to get rid of rats in her neighborhood an exterminator pumps carbon monoxide in their holes.

Another non-profit organization, Major reusehas tried to help seed a new generation of tree bed managers.

Gil Lopez, an events and volunteer coordinator, arrived at Middle College High School in Long Island City one recent morning, bringing tools, gloves and bins of compost. He showed 10th and 11th graders how to break up (or aerate) hard, compacted soil so rainwater could seep to the roots in the tree beds behind the school.

Ximena Morales, 15, used a three-prong hand cultivator to loosen the dirt before spreading compost over it. “It’s hard on the trees, but there are things we can do,” she said.

Once trees are established, they are virtually self-contained, with the exception of periodic pruning by the Parks Department, with the result that people often trample the dirt around them or cover them with brick, stone or concrete. Some people chain bicycles to tree trunks or forget to remove Christmas lights that can strangle trees as they grow.

“Every tree bed is like a CSI site,” says Matthew López-Jensen, an artist whose work includes photographs of trees.

Tree guards – the low fences around beds – help discourage people from stepping on the sand. Some guards reflect the building architecture; see the round ones 520 West 28th Street at Chelsea for example. Others are traditional, black-painted iron.

But iron guards can cost $1200 or more. Lincoln Restler, a Brooklyn city councilman, has been working with Big Reuse on a do-it-yourself kit with steel poles and pressure-treated wood rails that would cost $275, and a pilot installation is planned in his district this spring.

Nearly any form of surveillance is preferable to impenetrable walls of brick or stone that some landlords erect around beds and then fill with dirt, experts say. The forts prevent rainwater from flowing from a sidewalk into a bed, and piling soil around the trunk of a tree can rot the bark and lead to disease.

Some gardeners come up with ambitious plans for tree beds.

Greenpoint resident Ian Resler submitted drawings for a bed to his condo board and received an approved budget. He then surrounded the Japanese lilac with plants and added a solar lantern and a copper birdbath.

Mr. Resler said neighbors have praised his miniature garden, but he has also had to dig out beer cans and once felt compelled to talk to someone who let his pit bull jump over the tree guard and kick up dirt after it relieved itself.

“Things like this allow you to meet your neighbors, good and bad,” he said.