Job Creators Who Like Flowers

Yesterday, with no input from sniveling movie producers or rioting by football fans, America’s biggest city unveiled a wide flowery tree pit on the grotty edge of a chichi section of Brooklyn. The debut may have faded in the uproar over power and its perversions, so let’s look at a replay.

The new tree pit, technically a “bioswale,” soaks up rainwater at a lower cost and with more reliability than a gutter. It creates what New York City parks chief Adrian Benepe calls “entry-level skilled jobs” in weeding, planting and maintenance. It has money to cover its costs from a multi-year city budget and it grows in tandem with broader efforts in Philadelphia and San Francisco that get additional fuel from new borrowing,

But let’s go back to talking about how there are no jobs and no ways to create them, how greenies are soft, and how the Oscar show will go. If we have time, let’s sniff about people calling BS on crony capitalism too- because we know that in the real world, there is no alternative.

Tags: Adrian Benepe, America, New York City, parks chief, Philadelphia, San Francisco, the Oscar

Alec Appelbaum writes about real estate, true-green business and architecture for the New York Times, Fast Company, New York magazine and others. He has also contributed to Architectural Record, the A ...read more