A city park will be turning over a new leaf as new trees and plants take root.
Environmental organization Save Our Seine will be planting more than 1,000 trees and plants in Southdale’s Marlene Street Park to improve the green space. The small park is bordered on the east and south by Seine River and is located beside the Marlene Street Community Resource Centre and housing complex.
“It feels great to be giving back and getting dirty,” said SOS managing director Ryan Palmquist.
SOS is looking for volunteers to participate in the weekend planting blitz planned for Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Anyone who wants to participate can simply show up or register ahead of time via email (volunteer@saveourseine.com).
Long before Winnipeg’s amalgamation as Unicity in 1972, the City of St. Vital used the land as a garbage dump until the 1950s. The area was cleaned up and capped with sand and sod and, in 2015, the space became a City of Winnipeg park.
Palmquist said the soon-to-be reforested area will benefit neighbourhood residents and provide a natural filter against landfill chemicals leeching into the river; tree and bush roots can absorb the rainwater, preventing it from further damaging the watershed area.
“For a good century, we in Winnipeg and in many cities, regarded rivers as being, literally, a dumping ground. We set up landfills right next to our river,” he said. “(These trees) are like an act of healing with the river and the urban community that surrounds it.”
The Manitoba Habitat Heritage Corp. — a Crown conservation, restoration and wildlife enhancement funding source — is covering the cost to purchase eight different species of trees and plants, including American elm, linden elm, Saskatoon bushes and cottonwood.
Palmquist said SOS is planning to do the same thing at another location in August.
“There’s many locations that would benefit from reforestation and replacement of vegetation loss,” he said. “What particularly excites us is the expansion of the urban forest into areas that reclaim historic places.”
St. Vital Coun. Brian Mayes said some, but not all, of the former landfill sites in the city have been transformed into recreational facilities.
Mayes said any further development at the park is unlikely because of the garbage underneath, but having more trees and plants will enhance the space.
“It’s just a good park,” he said. “If you want to go sit on a bench and have a picnic, if you want to take your kids out there and kick the ball around, I think it’s really good for that,” he said.
Palmquist said more than three dozen volunteers have registered to help on the weekend, and he’s hoping to have 100 in total.
“It’s going to be a lot of work, but it’s going to be a lot of fun, too,” he said.
matthew.frank@freepress.mb.ca
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