Denver community activists, environmentalists green up Globeville
A long-abandoned effort to green up a section of Globeville that is split by Interstate 70 is being resurrected by community activists, residents, business people and environmental organizations.
Blocks of planters attached to the base of tall, white concrete walls along 10 blocks on each side of the highway contain no greenery, just lumps of soil and one lone tree in the north-side planting beds. The scene tells the tale of a project left to wither away.
Anthony Garcia Sr., an artist and community activist, said the Colorado Department of Transportation built the planters along 46th Avenue as part of work on the interstate.
“However, they didn’t maintain them,” Garcia said. “So 20 years later, we’re stuck with these ugly looking planters.”
The community and arts organization Birdseed Collective, headed by Garcia, is part of a group called the Green Dot Coalition that is writing plans and working with Globeville residents to bring more trees and plants to one of Denver’s least green neighborhoods. Garcia will lead fellow artists to paint murals on the walls.
Other coalition members are Jevon Taylor, a business owner in the River North Art District; The Park People, a nonprofit that plants trees and improves parks; the regional office of the National Wildlife Federation; and the Design Workshop Foundation, the nonprofit arm of Design Workshop, a landscape architecture and urban design business.
The coalition recently got word that the Environmental Protection Agency approved a $480,000 grant for the project.
The Design Workshop Foundation, with help from the Denver Botanic Gardens, has compiled a preliminary list of plants and trees that shouldn’t require a lot of water. Garcia and others have been talking to people in the neighborhood about what they want to see in the space.
“Our whole goal now is really diving in with the community,” said Taylor, CEO of the Green Spaces Market and co-working space in RiNo.
Taylor has worked with other businesses, the National Wildlife Federation and neighborhood groups to increase the number of trees and plants in Five Points. He sees the work in Globeville as a continuation of those efforts and projects underway in other historically underserved and under-resourced parts of Denver.
“We’ve been planting more trees in our neighborhood for the past six years. We’ve also been doing multiple environmental studies as well as workshops with our community,” Garcia said.
Garcia said Birdseed Collective and the community can come together to make sure the plants and trees are maintained.
“We just want nice things in our neighborhood and we as an organization are the ones that are trying to do our best to connect the dots and make sure our neighborhood gets what they need,” said Garcia, who grew up in Globeville.
Planting many seeds
The long, empty planters at the base of the wall, which looks like the outside of a fortress, stand as both opportunities lost and opportunities to seize.
Tamara Rollison, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Transportation, said the planters are likely more than 20 years old. Staffers believe CDOT built the planters during work on the Mousetrap, the intersection of Interstates 25 and 70, and a viaduct in the late 1980s or mid-90s.
A CDOT landscaping crew planted flowers and trees, but the vegetation was later dug up when a part of the irrigation system malfunctioned. Rollison said the agency didn’t have the technicians to take care of the equipment and no longer had landscaping crews.
Sarah Konradi, executive director of the Design Workshop Foundation, said contemplating the potential of the site is exciting “once you get past the disappointment that you feel when you see spaces that should never have gotten to be in the condition that they are.”
“It truly is an opportunity. There are not many times when you can recapture that much space in a big city and in a city like Denver that’s not very green anyway,” Konradi said.
A 2019 analysis by The Denver Post found that excluding undeveloped land around the airport, nearly half the land in Denver’s city limits is paved or built over, up from less than 20% in the mid-1970s.
Greenery and open spaces are even less common in areas home to lower-income residents and people of color. Geographic information system mapping by Design Workshop found that the tree canopy is roughly 12% or less in Globeville, whose population is predominantly Hispanic. In contrast, the tree canopy is about 34% in parts of south Denver.
The lack of tree cover and plants and a higher percentage of paved-over surfaces, as in Globeville, drive up temperatures, aggravating the “urban heat island” effect that’s expected to worsen with climate change. Daytime temperatures in a city can be 1 to 7 degrees hotter than outlying areas and nighttime temperatures can be 2 to 5 degrees hotter, according to the EPA.
Air pollution from traffic, industrial and energy facilities and contamination from former lead smelters as well as arsenic and cadmium production have created major health and environmental issues for people in Globeville and the adjacent Elyria-Swansea neighborhood. A 2014 report by the city said area residents had some of the highest rates of cardiovascular disease, asthma, obesity and diabetes in Denver.
The report also noted the limited opportunities for outdoor activities because of disconnected streets and sidewalks. The I-70 project will “create an aesthetically-welcoming corridor and will improve environmental conditions,” the Green Dot Coalition said. Nearly 3,700 area residents are within a 10-minute walk of the site.
“You think about all the people that walk by it, ride their bikes by it, drive in their cars by it, that live next to it every single day. It’s going to touch a lot of people,” Konradi said. “It’s a big project. It’s going to take a while, but it’s going to have an absolutely huge impact.”
It takes a community to grow a garden
Globeville residents and coalition members will plant test plots starting in the spring, but sowing the seeds for the project’s success has been ongoing.
“The planting is the easy part,” said Lindsay Cutler, program director for The Park People.
Building relationships and cultivating long-term stewardship take time and work. Cutler said Globeville residents have been working for a while to increase the number of trees throughout the neighborhood. Working with The Park People and other groups, the Birdseed Collective has led the planting of at least 120 trees annually the past six years.
The Park People is working on a plan that will include hiring a neighborhood resident to work with the person who currently serves as the organization’s “community connector” for Globeville. The nonprofit wants to offer five residents training to become community foresters.
And The Park People will help provide labor through TreeForce, a workforce development program that prepares adults for jobs in urban forestry.
“The Park People are helping us construct a long-term stewardship plan that will in part be administered by the project team, but the long-term goal is to be equipping folks in the community to be stewards themselves,” said Alicia Mountain, the urban nature-based solutions manager for the regional office of the National Wildlife Federation.
Murals will also be painted on the walls along the highway, with the images based on feedback the coalition gets from the community.
Garcia, a renowned muralist, will oversee the work of artists as they turn the big white walls into art. The timing of the work is yet to be determined, Garcia said.
“There should be one good week in the spring where we have multiple artists come out. We can make that happen in a matter of days,” he said.
Taylor said people in the neighborhood are excited to see something happening with the long-neglected space.
As if on cue, a man driving by stopped his car to find out what was going on as Taylor walked with visitors down the road to look at the planters. Jose Esquibel, who has lived in Globeville for 45 years, thinks people will appreciate new flowers, shrubs and trees in the neighborhood.
“I’ve got a good yard in the summer. I have nothing but roses and hollyhocks and people just came to take pictures with their kids and their grandkids,” Esquibel said.
Driving away, he told Taylor, “Keep up the good work.”
A long-abandoned effort to green up a section of Globeville that is split by Interstate 70 is being resurrected by community activists, residents, business people and environmental organizations.
Blocks of planters attached to the base of tall, white concrete walls along 10 blocks on each side of the highway contain no greenery, just lumps of soil and one lone tree in the north-side planting beds. The scene tells the tale of a project left to wither away.
Anthony Garcia Sr., an artist and community activist, said the Colorado Department of Transportation built the planters along 46th Avenue as part of work on the interstate.
“However, they didn’t maintain them,” Garcia said. “So 20 years later, we’re stuck with these ugly looking planters.”
The community and arts organization Birdseed Collective, headed by Garcia, is part of a group called the Green Dot Coalition that is writing plans and working with Globeville residents to bring more trees and plants to one of Denver’s least green neighborhoods. Garcia will lead fellow artists to paint murals on the walls.
Other coalition members are Jevon Taylor, a business owner in the River North Art District; The Park People, a nonprofit that plants trees and improves parks; the regional office of the National Wildlife Federation; and the Design Workshop Foundation, the nonprofit arm of Design Workshop, a landscape architecture and urban design business.
The coalition recently got word that the Environmental Protection Agency approved a $480,000 grant for the project.
The Design Workshop Foundation, with help from the Denver Botanic Gardens, has compiled a preliminary list of plants and trees that shouldn’t require a lot of water. Garcia and others have been talking to people in the neighborhood about what they want to see in the space.
“Our whole goal now is really diving in with the community,” said Taylor, CEO of the Green Spaces Market and co-working space in RiNo.
Taylor has worked with other businesses, the National Wildlife Federation and neighborhood groups to increase the number of trees and plants in Five Points. He sees the work in Globeville as a continuation of those efforts and projects underway in other historically underserved and under-resourced parts of Denver.
“We’ve been planting more trees in our neighborhood for the past six years. We’ve also been doing multiple environmental studies as well as workshops with our community,” Garcia said.
Garcia said Birdseed Collective and the community can come together to make sure the plants and trees are maintained.
“We just want nice things in our neighborhood and we as an organization are the ones that are trying to do our best to connect the dots and make sure our neighborhood gets what they need,” said Garcia, who grew up in Globeville.
Planting many seeds
The long, empty planters at the base of the wall, which looks like the outside of a fortress, stand as both opportunities lost and opportunities to seize.
Tamara Rollison, a spokeswoman for the Colorado Department of Transportation, said the planters are likely more than 20 years old. Staffers believe CDOT built the planters during work on the Mousetrap, the intersection of Interstates 25 and 70, and a viaduct in the late 1980s or mid-90s.
A CDOT landscaping crew planted flowers and trees, but the vegetation was later dug up when a part of the irrigation system malfunctioned. Rollison said the agency didn’t have the technicians to take care of the equipment and no longer had landscaping crews.
Sarah Konradi, executive director of the Design Workshop Foundation, said contemplating the potential of the site is exciting “once you get past the disappointment that you feel when you see spaces that should never have gotten to be in the condition that they are.”
“It truly is an opportunity. There are not many times when you can recapture that much space in a big city and in a city like Denver that’s not very green anyway,” Konradi said.
A 2019 analysis by The Denver Post found that excluding undeveloped land around the airport, nearly half the land in Denver’s city limits is paved or built over, up from less than 20% in the mid-1970s.
Greenery and open spaces are even less common in areas home to lower-income residents and people of color. Geographic information system mapping by Design Workshop found that the tree canopy is roughly 12% or less in Globeville, whose population is predominantly Hispanic. In contrast, the tree canopy is about 34% in parts of south Denver.
The lack of tree cover and plants and a higher percentage of paved-over surfaces, as in Globeville, drive up temperatures, aggravating the “urban heat island” effect that’s expected to worsen with climate change. Daytime temperatures in a city can be 1 to 7 degrees hotter than outlying areas and nighttime temperatures can be 2 to 5 degrees hotter, according to the EPA.
Air pollution from traffic, industrial and energy facilities and contamination from former lead smelters as well as arsenic and cadmium production have created major health and environmental issues for people in Globeville and the adjacent Elyria-Swansea neighborhood. A 2014 report by the city said area residents had some of the highest rates of cardiovascular disease, asthma, obesity and diabetes in Denver.
The report also noted the limited opportunities for outdoor activities because of disconnected streets and sidewalks. The I-70 project will “create an aesthetically-welcoming corridor and will improve environmental conditions,” the Green Dot Coalition said. Nearly 3,700 area residents are within a 10-minute walk of the site.
“You think about all the people that walk by it, ride their bikes by it, drive in their cars by it, that live next to it every single day. It’s going to touch a lot of people,” Konradi said. “It’s a big project. It’s going to take a while, but it’s going to have an absolutely huge impact.”
It takes a community to grow a garden
Globeville residents and coalition members will plant test plots starting in the spring, but sowing the seeds for the project’s success has been ongoing.
“The planting is the easy part,” said Lindsay Cutler, program director for The Park People.
Building relationships and cultivating long-term stewardship take time and work. Cutler said Globeville residents have been working for a while to increase the number of trees throughout the neighborhood. Working with The Park People and other groups, the Birdseed Collective has led the planting of at least 120 trees annually the past six years.
The Park People is working on a plan that will include hiring a neighborhood resident to work with the person who currently serves as the organization’s “community connector” for Globeville. The nonprofit wants to offer five residents training to become community foresters.
And The Park People will help provide labor through TreeForce, a workforce development program that prepares adults for jobs in urban forestry.
“The Park People are helping us construct a long-term stewardship plan that will in part be administered by the project team, but the long-term goal is to be equipping folks in the community to be stewards themselves,” said Alicia Mountain, the urban nature-based solutions manager for the regional office of the National Wildlife Federation.
Murals will also be painted on the walls along the highway, with the images based on feedback the coalition gets from the community.
Garcia, a renowned muralist, will oversee the work of artists as they turn the big white walls into art. The timing of the work is yet to be determined, Garcia said.
“There should be one good week in the spring where we have multiple artists come out. We can make that happen in a matter of days,” he said.
Taylor said people in the neighborhood are excited to see something happening with the long-neglected space.
As if on cue, a man driving by stopped his car to find out what was going on as Taylor walked with visitors down the road to look at the planters. Jose Esquibel, who has lived in Globeville for 45 years, thinks people will appreciate new flowers, shrubs and trees in the neighborhood.
“I’ve got a good yard in the summer. I have nothing but roses and hollyhocks and people just came to take pictures with their kids and their grandkids,” Esquibel said.
Driving away, he told Taylor, “Keep up the good work.”
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