by and | Apr 26, 2024 4:14 pm | Comments (3)
Laura Glesby Photo
Alex Nieves checks out a freshly-cleaned portable toilet on Thursday afternoon.
An accumulation of feces, old clothes, and drug paraphernalia prompted the city to increase the number of portable restrooms on the New Haven Green from two to six, as city officials search for a more permanent bathroom solution.
by | Mar 26, 2024 10:49 am | Comments (13)
Wikimedia photo
Only one kind of grass allowed for public mower job hopefuls.
City of New Haven job posting
Pre-employment drug test required for seasonal parks caretaker job.
If you want to make $18 an hour cutting grass in the city’s parks this summer, then you better not smoke grass before applying for the job.
Because New Haven requires prospective seasonal parks workers to pass a drug test, including for marijuana, even though recreational cannabis is now legal statewide.
by | Feb 29, 2024 2:58 pm | Comments (21)
Tom Breen Photo
Round 2's coming: Jovon Ladson navigates concrete quarter pipe added in the previous round of skateboarder-city-designed renovations.
Skateboarders young and old envisioned stairs, an awning, and 24/7 lights as they met with city officials to map out a plan for a $250,000 renovation of their park.
Continue reading ‘Skateboarders Envision All-Weather 24/7 Park’
by | Jan 31, 2024 9:40 am | Comments (11)
Brian Slattery Photos
Davis and Burgess.
On Tuesday morning, Peter Davis, a volunteer river keeper with the city parks department, and fellow volunteer David Burgess were over the edge of the slope off Diamond Street in Beaver Hills, lugging a dilapidated couch out of the woods. Around them was a thin carpet of other discarded objects. Among the trash bags were a fan, a decaying rug, a mattress, a rusting wheelchair.
It was a lot of garbage. Davis and Burgess were taking it one piece at a time.
Continue reading ‘Volunteers Take Out The Trash At Beaver Brook’
by | Jan 30, 2024 3:13 pm | Comments (8)
X'Nique suggests to City Engineer Giovanni Zinn that city prioritize shade and sensory play.
A tire swing. A skate park. “A lot of butterflies.” And toys promoting “sensory play.”
Neighborhood children eagerly offered those visions for a planned redesign of Kensington Playground, following years of adult-dominated debates over the future of the park.
by | Jan 29, 2024 10:03 am | Comments (9)
Allan Appel Photo
Anthropology major Chris Kowalski (above) and Aaron Goode (below) de-vine by Beaver Brook.
Brian Slattery Photo
Clip high, clip low, create a window. Also don’t be a Tarzan and pull on those cut vines lest you disturb insect habitats or the birds high in the trees above.
Those were among the illuminating arboricultural tips offered for some serious de-vining of New Haven’s invasive-threatened native oaks, maples, sycamores, and hackberry trees growing on a beautiful but under-loved patch of city-owned forested greenspace.
by | Jan 22, 2024 4:54 pm | Comments (3)
It looks like the Christmas season is finally coming to an end on the New Haven Green.
Blame C.J. Zemke.
by | Jan 22, 2024 2:20 pm | Comments (3)
Laura Glesby Photo
New parks chief Siciliano: Intends "to learn the town."
by | Jan 15, 2024 3:23 pm | Comments (29)
Laura Glesby Photo
Parks staffer Janice Parker, right, explains the department's current structure.
A public-private funding structure. A “superintendent of fields.” A department divided into geographical districts, each with a point person for neighbors to contact.
Those ideas are all on the table as the city moves forward with a plan to un-merge the Parks and Public Works Department.
by | Jan 9, 2024 3:59 pm | Comments (10)
The city ordered six people to clear out of a four-tent encampment in Edgewood Park after working with them to find indoor places to stay.
by | Dec 7, 2023 9:07 am | Comments (8)
Nora Grace-Flood photo
URI's Chris Ozyck solicits public parks feedback at 200 Orange.
Pick up more litter, clean the bathrooms better, and designate more point people to deal with public park concerns.
Those are some of the top priorities New Haveners have for their city’s green spaces, as documented in a community input process overseen by the Urban Resource Initiative on behalf of the Elicker administration.
by | Nov 21, 2023 9:56 am | Comments (2)
Fairmont Park's planned new play area.
A splash pad, swing set, and children’s play area are en route to Fairmont Park, thanks to playground upgrade plans for the Fair Haven Heights greenspace.
Continue reading ‘Make Way For A New Playground At Fairmont Park’
by | Nov 17, 2023 9:20 am | Comments (5)
Thomas Breen file photo
City Chief Arborist Anastasia Mixsell.
New Haven may soon have an urban forest management plan.
But what does that mean?
Continue reading ‘$360K Planning Grant To Bolster "Urban Forests"’
by | Nov 3, 2023 8:57 am | Comments (9)
Abiba Biao photo
Tashi at work planting cherry blossoms in Wooster Sq.
Drenched in sweat, Tashi loaded up a wheelbarrow with nutrient-dense wood chips and mulch from a truck, ready to wheel it to his tree planting crew in Wooster Square. Although the work wasn’t glamorous or pretty, it would be worth it in the spring when the cherry tree’s blossoms come into bloom. Until then, the newly planted trees would have to rest and gain their energy under the autumn sun.
by | Oct 20, 2023 12:19 pm | Comments (51)
Paul Bass photo
David Belowsky: Vote no to charter revisions — and let him live out his life on the city's Board of Park Commissioners.
Lawn signs opposing changes to the city’s charter have started popping up around town — after the chair of New Haven’s parks commission printed 25 “Vote No” placards in a bid to preserve his lifetime seat on the volunteer body that oversees public greenspaces.
That man, David Belowsky, isn’t the only New Havener paying attention to this year’s general election ballot question.
Continue reading ‘Parks Lifer Campaigns Against New Charter’
by | Sep 26, 2023 12:01 pm | Comments (17)
Thomas Breen photo
A newly installed 988 sign on the Ferry Street Bridge.
Three hopeful numbers will be posted atop East Rock Park, in a sign urging those who are considering harming themselves to reach out to a new national suicide-prevention hotline instead.
by | Sep 21, 2023 4:08 pm | Comments (132)
Thomas Breen photo
At Wednesday's parks commission meeting: this crew doesn't have power over summit road.
The Elicker administration — and not the parks commission — will have the final say over whether or not the road to the top of East Rock Park remains largely closed to cars, and open to pedestrians and cyclists only.
The mayor said he has received widespread community support for keeping the road largely closed to cars, so he plans not to make a change.
Continue reading ‘Mayor: I'm Keeping Park Road Mostly Car-Closed’
by | Sep 21, 2023 1:21 pm | Comments (20)
Thomas Breen photo
Acting Director Rebecca Bombero: Consultant-led process "could lead to a reconfiguration" of parks-public works.
The Elicker administration is moving towards a potential un-merging of the parks and public works departments — or an entirely different parks-service setup altogether — by seeking a consultant to host community conversations around how City Hall should tend its public greenspaces.
Continue reading ‘City Steps Towards Parks Department Re-Redo’
by | Aug 21, 2023 12:17 pm | Comments (7)
Aaron Goode, Jean Webb, Marty Lendroth take on the jungle in the Heights.
It’s technically Ailanthus Altissima, or colloquially Tree of Heaven, but in Fair Haven Heights’ Fairmont Park it’s more often called, with a grrrrrrrr, as gardeners labor to uproot it, the Tree of Hell. Or from Hell.
But there’s now a lot less of this quick rising (thus toward heaven?) invasive Chinese species, and that’s thanks to decades of effort by Sylvia Dorsey and her stalwart crew of Friends of Fairmont Park.
Continue reading ‘Fairmont Park Gardeners Send Trees Of Heaven Straight To ...’
by | Aug 14, 2023 12:14 pm | Comments (2)
Allan Appel photo
Friends of Kensington Park's Olivia Marston, Myles Branch and his sketch of future equipment.
How about an upgraded splash pad — one where there’s not only refreshing spray, but the really cool kind where buckets of water fall on your head?
Continue reading ‘Pizza & Playground Plans Prevail At Kensington Park’
by | Jul 20, 2023 3:03 pm | Comments (93)
Thomas Breen Photo
After a months-long debate and impasse over whether to fully reopen the road up to the summit of East Rock Park, the Board of Park Commissioners may have stumbled upon a solution: a magic bus.
Continue reading ‘Bus Fix Floated For East Rock Park Impasse’
by | Jul 5, 2023 12:18 pm | Comments (4)
Allan Appel photos
Pablo Sumba, marveling at the mouth of a freshly caught porgy ...
... at Lighthouse Point Park on the day before July 4th.
Pablo Sumba and his family left their land-locked home in Waterbury early in the morning to fit in as many waterfront activities as they could during a pre-holiday trip to Lighthouse Point Park — including fishing, swimming, grilling (some of the 12 porgies they caught), and just hanging out with five-month-old baby Lucas, who lay on a blanket on the green grass nearby.
Continue reading ‘Catching Porgies With Pablo At Lighthouse Point’
by | Jul 3, 2023 11:14 am | Comments (3)
Asher Joseph photos
Ranezmay (right) and her friends delight in the spouts of water on the splash pad ...
... as volunteers prepare to mulch a nearby patch of dirt.
The sound of rustling leaves merged with squeals of joy and the gurgling of the Kensington Playground splash pad as a light mist wafted through the heavy heat. Despite the stifling smog that hung in the air, neither the Friends of Kensington Playground clean-up volunteers nor the neighborhood’s kids let it deter them from rejoicing in the beauty of a recently saved public park.
Continue reading ‘Splashing & Mulching At Kensington Playground With Ranezmay, Pat, Jane, & Friends’
by | Jun 26, 2023 4:59 pm | Comments (1)
Asher Joseph photo
Sierra Welch, a participant of New Haven's Youth @ Work program, with her handy clippers.
Stalks snapped as tie-dye-clad Sierra Welch hunched over a cluster of Japanese knotweeds, wrenching the invasive plant out of the ground off a beaten path in Edgewood Park on Monday afternoon.
Continue reading ‘Believe-It-Or-Knotweed In Edgewood Park With Sierra’
by | Jun 26, 2023 12:14 pm | Comments (1)
Kian Ahmadi photos
Annemarie Rivera-Berrios stands by the playscape with her rake and shovel
Chris Ozyck and Mike Simons add new mulch to the playground
It took just under half an hour for AnneMarie Rivera-Berrios and a small group of friends to level the mound of mulch that had been sitting by the swing sets at Peat Meadow Park for three months — to make sure that kids have a softer ground to land on the next time they come out to enjoy the Annex public playground.
Continue reading ‘Sprucing Up Peat Meadow Park With AnneMarie’
