PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — A section of West Fairmount Park has 200 new trees thanks to participants of a six-week volunteer program lead by a nonprofit organization that brings Philadelphia parks to life.
The Fairmount Park Conservancy held its first Natural Lands Volunteer Leadership program. 20 people of various backgrounds completed six weeks of intensive training, followed by 20 hours of volunteer service.
"These volunteers are from all over the city," said Lindsey Walker, the conservancy's volunteer and environmental program manager.
"They are people who wanted to get more deeply involved in caring for our natural spaces in Philadelphia. They wanted to expand their knowledge and their skill set and meet other people who are interested in doing the same kind of work and just give back."
Among them was Sirron Carrector of North Philadelphia, who works in IT. He said the program gave him a renewed sense of pride in the city.
"Now I can actually walk through the park and say, 'Oh, I did that,' or 'I was a part of this project and I helped cleaned this up,'" he said. "Even when I do see some things, I'm more proactive in changing it myself when I'm out."
The graduation Saturday was marked by the planting of 200 trees at the mouth of the Trolley Trail near Belmont Plateau.
"It's more rough than I though it would be. So you have to expose the roots. You actually use a knife. We get to use this kind of weaponry, this garden weaponry here," he laughed, "and cut through the roots so it can get through the soil and grow properly."
Carrector said the volunteer effort has been therapeutic.
South Philadelphia resident Donna Fahres said there was more to the work than just digging a hole and plopping in a tree.
"It's a little more technical. We want to make sure the tree survives," she explained.
"The idea is that it takes a lot of work to plant a tree and you want to make sure it's going to survive to its full mature age, and that could be up to 100 years. So you want to make sure that the effort you put in really lasts and makes an impact to the area."
Construction on the 4.5-mile multi-use Trolley Trail is ongoing and is expected to be completed in the summer.