Many residents in the region live in areas with little fresh food and many vacant lots or lawns as greenspace. Vacant lots can be a liability, attracting litter, vandalism and loitering, which increases perceptions of disinvestment and lack of safety. Mowing vacant lots may limit blight, but it doesn’t create a thriving, productive, resilient neighborhood. Rainwater struggles to enter the ground, flooding roadways and basements. Residents experience the negative effects of these environmental conditions but have limited resources to maintain common spaces that would improve them when the best case return on investment is having a lawn that doesn’t provide a proportional yield back to residents.

We need more trees and especially trees that provide a return for our investment in their care. There are many spaces in the region that exist as lawns and transitioning these to native plant mixes, edible landscaping with community orchards and food forests, and even larger trees that produce fruit and nut crops is a way to add value and increase activation of these places. In addition, some places should be prioritized for larger shade and canopy species, because shade is immensely valuable especially in heat islands.

These fruit and nut trees will need to be maintained, but these trees need a different care regimen than other community gardening crops. They require more care in the spring and less in the heat of summer, that is when you find a good book and enjoy the shade.

With more fruit trees grown in multi-species, diverse, ecological food forests, we could provide for insects, birds, and the humans who care for these spaces.