On a sunny afternoon in early October, three girls hesitate in front of the Sherman Avenue Community Garden in the Bronx. The fourth and fifth graders, on their way home from school, peer through the fence into the gap between brick apartment buildings. They see a little paradise, filled with shade, fruit trees, and raised beds overflowing with an enormous pumpkin vine and the last of the summer’s tomatoes. Maria Rodriguez, one of the garden’s leaders, comes out to say hello. “Is this your garden?” asks one of girls. “This is your garden,” Rodriguez answers. “It’s for everybody: to enjoy, relax, plant, look at the flowers, hear the birds sing.” Many of New York City’s estimated 450 community gardens were created in the 1970s, on abandoned city-owned properties. In 1978, The Trust for Public Land launched a program to help a dozen groups formally acquire their gardens, mostly from the City. As the economy improved in the 1990s, then-mayor Rudolph Giuliani announced that hundreds of city-owned lots— including many gardens—would be auctioned to raise funds and to build housing. Protests erupted around the city, and the state sued to stop the sale. In 1999, TPL stepped in at the eleventh hour to
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purchase 62 of the gardens. TPL’s ultimate goal was to find a way for gardeners to own them. “The Trust for Public Land didn’t just buy the gardens, we embarked on a process with neighborhoods to help ensure the gardens’ permanence, long-term stewardship, and importance in a network of New York City public open-space,” said Andy Stone, director of The Trust for Public Land’s Parks for People–New York City program.With support from its donors, TPL organized garden land-trusts in Manhattan, Brooklyn-Queens, and the Bronx; invested $4 million in physical improvements to make the gardens more inviting; and trained gardeners in the skills needed to manage the three land trusts. In 2011, TPL transferred gardens to the land trusts. Collectively, the three land trusts will protect more community gardens than any private non-profit in the nation. According to New Yorkers For Parks, forty of the gardens are situated in districts where most residents live farther than 10 minutes from a public green space. Stone emphasizes the crucial role these gardens play, “For many neighborhoods, these compact spaces splash color and breathe fresh air into crowded neighborhoods throughout the city, and give hundreds of families places to play, dig in the dirt, and grow fresh food.”