Great examples of urban greening in major cities

Cities love ripping each others’ great ideas off, outdoing one another, and generally competing to be known as the best, most exciting, culturally rewarding, and now thankfully the greenest places to live, work and play. For example, here’s a hand railing in Dubai that was inspired by Vancouver’s Seawall. See? Case closed.

Joking aside, green urban initiatives and urban design trends have traveled along a handful of vectors with increasing speed between key places where ideas are generated and other places that are looking to attract, adopt and adapt those leading design principles or projects that have caught eyes. Vancouver has solidified itself as one of those places where ideas are generated and then loosed upon the world. Think Vancouverism, think Greenpeace, think Ecological Footprint; these are ideas or movements that have begun here and have traveled far and wide with great success. The first of which relates directly to our earlier mentioned handrail, anyhow, enough about the handrail. Let’s talk trees and other forms of urban greening!

New York's High Line

Some of my personal favorites that I feel relate to this project in one way or another are New York’s High Line, which has recently been noted regarding the debate over Vancouver’s viaducts, Chicago’s Green Roof renaissance, and Toronto’s Greenhere, initiatives in the Davenport neighbourhood. All of these take place in very large cities and have been embraced by their residents as a point of pride. They have recaptured the living warmth and inviting natural sense of organic space and infused it with urban design principles to affect dramatic, and enthusiastically embraced, changes to underutilized or neglected spaces. Here are some more photos from other cities who have undertaken bold and innovative urban greening projects from urban farming to reinventions of elevated train tracks and multi-storey parks. We can’t wait to post our own images in the coming months.

For good measure, here’s a nice little article on The Greenest Cities in the World. Vancouver makes the top 5. Let’s keep climbing. Check out Inhabitat for more awesome projects from around the world.

Growing Power, Milwaukee

 

Growing Power, Chicago

Osaka Japan's Namba Parks

Planter Design

Along with potential locations, we’re currently evaluating different  types of planters to find the design(s) that will best suit our neighbourhood, budget, and the types of trees we select. We’ve started to compile a photostream with various types of planters that we think are cool. We’d love to know what you think of them, or, if you know of other planter designs that are even better, send the photos our way and we’ll put them up for feedback as well. Of course, durability, price, and size will all be factors in our final decision, but it’s really important to us that we’re installing street furniture that the people in the ‘hood want to see.

One thing to note: The trees/plants in the photos are not representative of what we’ll be planting. We’re only considering the aesthetics of the planters in this phase.

We look forward to hearing your thoughts on this!

Cleaner Air is coming to Hastings

A recent study published by the University of Kent has “found that a 10 percent increase in urban tree coverage in mid-size cities can absorb about 12 percent of carbon emissions, contributing to cleaner air.” While it’s no news that trees sequester carbon from the air, it does invoke a beautiful image of our Hastings St. additions working hard to counteract the effects of the thousands of cars passing through the corridor daily. Can’t wait to see them in action!

Potential Sites for Planters

On Tuesday afternoon, the staff of the HXBIA and the Strathcona BIA walked through the neighbourhood identifying potential sites for the Urban Nursery planters. We selected 45(!) potential sites and we need to whittle it down to about 20 that we can submit to the City for review. Will you help us?

We took photos of all the potential sites and used Photoshop to superimpose a graphic of a tree to show you what it could look like. The photos can be seen in this Flickr album. Check them out and comment on them to let us know which locations you think are ideal for planter installations.

Once we’ve narrowed it down, we’ll put the potential sites on a Google map and send it to the City for approval. We will also be able to determine the types of trees and planters that will be most appropriate for each location.

We look forward to your feedback!

Want to see a tree planter here? Let us know!

The Urban Tree Nursery is underway

The Urban Tree Nursery is a joint initiative of the newly founded Hastings Crossing BIA and the SBIA, with additional involvement from UBC Faculty of Forestry, the City, and Mission Possible Enterprises. We will be installing a minimum of 12 tree planters along East Hastings, starting at Gore and working our way west and east to at least Carrall and Princess Streets. The planters will be designed with input from local artists, UBC Forestry, the City’s Engineering Department, and the Park Board. Saplings will grow for three to five years in the planters, and then they will be auctioned off and transported to their permanent homes. Funds from the auctions will go toward maintenance of the remaining trees and the purchase of future planters and trees. Residents will also have opportunities to sponsor individual trees; we will recognize sponsors with plaques on the planters.

Corner of Hastings and Gore: the centre of the Tree Nursery

Because we’re trying to create a program that is replicable, we will document our progress on this blog as the project develops. We’re happy to answer any questions about the Urban Tree Nursery and we look forward to seeing East Hastings Street blossom.