All over Toronto in 2006 people and businesses have been removing the cement covers that strangle our street trees, turning that little patch of uncovered dirt into canvasses for green-creativity. We first saw this happen during the summer of ’05 when the folks at 215 Spadina (more specifically, the Urbanspace property group) planted flowers in two pits in front of that location. This year they planted some of those tough looking urban cabbages that seem well-suited for the street. It’s made walking through the city, from block to block, a stroll through a bit of a natural art gallery.
Yesterday walking along Queen West for the first time in what seemed like ages I saw this pit in front of the Coupe Bizzarre hair salon that took advantage of the cold weather by including an icy element. Sort of looks like some of the haircuts that come out of Coupe Bizzarre. A few meters to the left was a tree pit with concrete cover still intact. The sad nub of a dead tree stump in the middle, waiting for the next dog to pee on it, proves why pit liberation is so good for the city.
2 comments
These are great when done right, as the example in your photograph. Just make sure you raise the soil to at least sidewalk level and put a border around it, otherwise it becomes an accident waiting to happen especially for the visually impaired.
Yeah, there are creative ways of solving that problem.
Still, many of the concrete covers that continue to exist are sunken and broken up, posing perhaps more of a problems because it seems like pavement, and seems like it should be as safe as any other part of the sidewalk. At least dirt and plant matter kind of sinks and/or is squishy, making them perhaps more white-cane recognizable.