Free Grass

Final years of the Bloomberg administration saw the beginning of an ambitious and much advertised campaign called Million Trees NYC, aimed at greening of New York City’s urban environment. The considerable cost of this program was something not often mentioned in the press. Yet much of green infrastructure of the city happens naturally, all by itself, and at no cost at all. 

Beat-up Lower East Side streets have grass that spontaneously grows in cracks of the pavement, between a street curb and sidewalk, or around concrete and brick walls. These strips of grass remain unnoticed – and sometimes they even get eliminated. But what if we spread and cultivated these “cracks” until they transform the sidewalks of the city into a pattern of decorative and friendly green surfaces? Introduction of special metal channels will control the growth, preventing any further deterioration.  Once put in place, these grass strips, like all weeds, will go on forever.