Biodiversity is essential in cultivating healthy communities.
The Local Center is supporting three neighborhood leaders to bring to life their visions for greener public spaces in neighborhoods most vulnerable to extreme heat and flooding. Drawing on community vision plans, leaders are working with technical advisors with expertise in landscape design, horticulture, and resiliency to bring improvements to their concrete public spaces.
Together, teams will increase greenery and create spaces for environmental education in plazas, parks, and streets, making their spaces more welcoming, vibrant, and resilient.
Projects
Tompkinsville, Staten Island
Staten Island Urban Center is working with Studio HIP to pilot climate solutions that advance food sovereignty near Tompkinsville Park. Building on recent activations in the park and through work with the Environmental Justice Coalition in Staten Island, SIUC aims to create a space to engage youth in urban garden education. The team is developing a proposal for a greenhouse space to grow herbs in tandem with the Abuelita Masala structure, that can be maintained by community members, and can serve as a teaching tool to equip the next generation for climate resilience.
Team
Staten Island Urban Center (SIUC) is a community development through community involvement organization, lifting the voices of Staten Island’s most marginalized and vulnerable communities experiencing social, environmental and criminal injustices. STUDIO HIP is a design collaborative which partners Landscape Architects and Designers, Environmental Educators, Artists and Certified Arborists in the pursuit of creative place making, innovative master planning efforts, recreational open space design and implementation.
Kelly Vilar
Jennifer Nitzky
Capitol District, Bronx
161st Street BID is working with FWD Studio to increase green space around Lou Gehrig Plaza. As partners with the NYC Department of Transportation Plaza Program, the BID has improved the plaza through activations such as the SAIL shading and seating structure, along with landscaping and greenery improvement in partnership with The Hort and The Future of Moshulu Parkland. Building on the 161st Street Vision Plan developed with community input in 2024, the team will expand green infrastructure in the plaza, with a focus on bringing native plants and shade to the space.
Team
161st Street BID was created to provide a vibrant commercial district and improve the quality of life for those who live, work, visit and shop on 161st Street in the Bronx. FWD Studio is a modern design practice focused on creating thoughtful, sustainable spaces that inspire.
Trey Jenkins
Ellen Garrett
Sunnyside, Queens
Sunnyside Shines BID is working with Field Form to bring more biodiversity to Lowery Plaza, an underutilized space beneath an elevated train structure. Lowery Plaza, located at 40th Street and Queens Boulevard, is one of the three plazas located underneath the concrete portion of the 7 train viaduct, and is actively programmed by the BID. Recently, the BID activated the plaza and surrounding streets with the Sunnyside Night Market. Building on ideas articulated in the Sunnyside Public Realm Vision Plan, the BID will work with a local florist to increase flora native to Western Queens in the plaza, and to test ways to make the plaza greener and more resilient to extreme weather events.
Team
Sunnyside Shines BID works to invigorate and enrich the economic life of Sunnyside, Queens by creating a safe, welcoming and dynamic commercial district in the neighborhood. Field Form is a resilient landscape design and build firm based in the Gowanus neighborhood of Brooklyn.
Dirk McCall de Palomá
Samuel Robinson
Support Our Work
The Local Center is made possible with support from the Charles H. Revson Foundation, Kornfeld Foundation, and Lily Auchincloss Foundation. The Local Center is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. Our programs are made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.
To learn more about supporting the Local Center, please contact Katherine Sacco, katherine@urbandesignforum.org and Lauren Nye, lauren.n@anhd.org.
