Save the Baltic Street Community Garden in Park Slope

Tomorrow night, Thursday, January 22, is an important meeting at MS 821, 4004 4th Avenue, btw 39th & 40th Streets, 7-9 p.m. This meeting is for the general public and concerned parties to share information and opinions about the proposed new school bldg at PS 133 where the Baltic St Garden is located.
- email, Julie Claire, Baltic Street Garden

You may not know the Baltic Street Garden [GMAP] by name, but many of us have travelled past it at high speed. Here's an exterior view, from 4th Avenue and Baltic Street.


During the summer, the huge, two-story tall and wide, brilliant orange-flowering Trumpet Vine, Campsis radicans, is its own 50mph garden (a garden that can be seen while driving past it at 50mph).


This garden was on the first 2008 Green With Envy tour, organized by the Brooklyn Community Gardeners Coalition (BCGC). At last Saturday's BCGC meeting, we learned that the Garden is threatened by plans to build a new school on the site. Several plots have already been destroyed without warning by drilling equipment for soil sampling to determine the precise location of a new school building.

The Baltic Street Garden was a pioneer garden in Park Slope. According to Jon Crow, co-chair of BCGC:

This was the pioneer garden in Park Slope, originally located on the site where the Key Food now stands [on 5th Avenue]. I believe the garden was recreated around 1980 in its current location.

This garden predated and inspired the creation of many other gardens in the area. This is not just an active, thriving garden. It's part of the history of the community gardening movement in Park Slope and Brooklyn.

It is a public meeting open to all, and we will probably have a chance to speak. [Rosemary Stuart, superintendent of District 15] was not sure exactly how it would be run, but the Board of Ed will be there along with the School Construction Authority, and anyone else who would like to attend. Please come if at all possible, so we can show them we care about preserving our present garden or creating a new garden space within the new school design.

There may or may not be a sign in sheet for people who wish to speak. I plan on speaking for sure, and if you would like to, look for a speaker sign in sheet at the entrance.

Related Content

Baltic Street Community Garden, Park Slope, Green With Envy Tour, I.6
My Flickr photo set of this garden