Green initiative continues to transform concrete for gardens on Hamilton’s Barton Street
Global News
A non profit continues with its 'depaving' projects that are transplanting concrete into trees, shrubs and pollinating plants for several central Hamilton neighbourhoods.
A program manager with a non-profit beautifying Hamilton’s Barton Street East by putting green spaces where there was once concrete says that taking on a pedestrian “bump out” near Sherman Avenue North has been a new experience.
“This is the first time we’re doing a bump out. It’s essentially a little corner piece owned by the city,” Green Venture’s Liz Enriquez said.
“It was just a concrete slab so we thought, OK, let’s just ask the city if we can do this little bump out, and we got approval.”
Community support and volunteering for “depave” projects along the thoroughfare are not something the long-term campaign has had trouble with, garnering as many as 40 volunteers recently during a conversion at the library on 571 Barton.
“We finished in an hour and I thought … well that was a lot faster than needed,” Enriquez recalled.
“It’s really encouraging because there is so much community support and we’re continuing to build community support.”
This past year, Green Venture hosted over a dozen stewardship events at sites across the city, highlighted by the installation of three new urban gardens and multiple mini-forest planting events.
Cleaning up litter and removing weeds at various greenspaces are a part of the effort to inject more greenery in a district that has essentially been a sea of asphalt and concrete over the decades.