In Central Park, The Grass is Always Taller on the Other Side
By Harper Everett and Libby Lin
As students descend into Grand Army Plaza, Manhattan, several attractions are there to distract while we wait for Central Park Conservancy’s manager of climate research, Michelle Mueller Gamez. At first glance, among the lush, overgrown greenery, a buttoned-up female park ranger sits proudly on her black-coated shire horse, trotting around tourists with a trained eye. Accompanied by the horse is a rustic statue of a woman, holding an old-fashioned camera in the middle of the plaza. The statue, dedicated to Diane Arbus, mirrors their exact line of work in journalism, who happened to take historic photos of the park. Gradually, the group is led out of the bustling streets and into an overgrown meadow.
Mueller Gamez, a proud member of Central Park Conservancy, approaches the woodland with admiration. “I’ve been here for eight years and I really started thinking about ecological infrastructure, such as how we can design essential services that we need with the outside world.” She is a strong advocate for urban parks, and manages the Central Park Climate Lab, a research initiative helping urban parks deal with the effects of climate change, after its launch in January, 2022.
Since her hire, she’s learned a lot about park management and climate mitigation. In partnership with the Yale School of Environment, the Climate Lab’s main goal is to “offer research and new tools to help urban parks deal with the effects of climate change”, in order to combat rising temperatures in the city. So far, as Michelle explained, there is a heightened interest in park development sparked from the project, shown by an overwhelming support of technological devices and conservation efforts.
In between stops, like the Central Park Zoo seal attraction, Mueller-Gamez deployed her information. “As we don’t know the air temperature, we put up an air temperature sensor on the trees and found lower surface temperature in Central Park than say, like, asphalt generally does.” says Mueller-Gamez. Once inside the meadow, an immediate display of shrubs, milkweed, and mint surrounded the mulch-planted path. An abundant amount of birds and squirrels, unlike regular stops in Central Park, were found roaming for food or dispersed across native trees. “Native Meadows provide habitat for insects and species and birds… you can even hear how many more birds there are in this landscape than, [say], a lawned area.”
“But we’re really focusing on how to quantify the benefits of a sort of landscape and parks just to promote it, as a way to combat climate change and working with natural systems.” Mueller Gamez said. Those benefits look a lot like cooler surface temperatures, better air quality, and hopefully more meadows like the one seen at Dene Slope.
The drive to receive more access to these overgrown areas are pivotal to the park’s success. On the way out of the thicket, skyscrapers can be seen through the gray fog settled above the group, bringing everyone back into urban reality. The clip-clop of horseshoes fell against the hot, cracked pavement. Mueller Gamez focuses attention onto one tree in particular, which had mulch planted around the roots. “Grass takes up space for roots, it makes competition for trees.” For that purpose, there are so-called “plant hardiness zones,” which are safe zones for trees free of common grass.
In regards to invasive species, Mueller Gamez made an analogy. “It’s like for a school of fish containing all the same species and have the same genetic makeup, if there’s a disease that comes to wipe them all away, or if there’s like a predator that likes that certain species, they’ll just like to eat it all,” she said. “But if you have an ecosystem or an ecology with multiple species and diverse pool of genes and genetics, it might be more resilient to like a disease pathogen or to like predators. And so I think the same is true in parks.” Some of these overpopulated species are spotted lanternflies and black locusts. They pose a threat to tree bark, especially the tree of heaven.
But how does this project lead to a bigger conversation? Among some of the park’s regulars were college students and one zoologist intern.
When prompted about NYC’s latest heat advisory, a children’s education intern for the zoo, Jariel, 21, vocalized his growing worry for the park children who were negatively affected by the sun. “I was here during the heatwave,” said Jariel. “It felt super dangerous to be outside during that time, especially for the kids.”
“There is a limited amount of cool spaces,” he continued. “The zoo is supposed to be an in person, outdoor type of thing. We have the tropic zone, which is, funnily enough, hotter on the inside than outside.” Instantaneously, he brought up the animals:. “So there’s only so much we can do with the sea lions outside, the bears we have outside…” His face scrunched up in concern.
After talking to a handful of students, more support for tree equity became clear. Julia, a 19-year-old visitor from the Netherlands, deliberately stuck out her hands while talking. “We live in a city which has a lot of trees around, so that helps a lot,” she said. “We’re not used to this, [the lack of trees in the city and the tall, big buildings].”
Her friend, Francis, also showed her support for the trees. “It gets hot and sticky, so [the trees are] really important,” says Francis. “You can feel the change in the air, and the smell here is better. It’s just nicer.”
As the Central Park Climate Lab expands their efforts, Muller Gamez fights to make ecosystem sustainability in the city more accessible to people of all backgrounds. “It was like a lot of work to make it happen. But now it’s kind of like a functioning forest in New York City and I really like it because it just does feel like a total escape from, like, you can’t even really even hear the city here or even see the towers,” she stopped to take one long look at a pine tree. “I think it’s cool that we have that opportunity to escape and it’s quite rare in Manhattan.”
Additional reporting from Julia Gregory.
