$50K grant to sustain collaborative youth-driven programs that support a circular economy
City Parks Alliance and The Toro Company are pleased to announce that Fairmount Park Organic Recycling Center in Philadelphia is the winner of the 2022 Toro Urban Park Innovation Award.
Portrait of the staff at the Fairmount Organic Recycling Center in West Fairmount Park. Photo by Ellen C. Miller/Philadelphia Parks and Recreation.
Sponsored by The Toro Company in partnership with City Parks Alliance, the Toro Urban Park Innovation Award recognizes innovation in park management and practices, and comes with a $50,000 grant.
The award will be presented at Greater & Greener 2022, City Parks Alliance’s biennial international parks conference June 18 – 21, in Philadelphia.
For more than 40 years, Fairmount Park Organic Recycling Center, operated by Philadelphia Parks & Recreation (PPR), has functioned as Philadelphia’s one stop shop for processing the City’s leaves and wood waste into useable materials. In recent years, the Center turned an increasing volume of collectibles into opportunities for local youth to gain woodworking skills and jobs while also supplying the park system with new furnishings.
”The Toro Company is proud to recognize the Fairmount Park Organic Recycling Center project as the winner of the Toro Urban Park Innovation Award,” said Judson McNeil, President, The Toro Company Foundation. “The project will undoubtedly make a positive impact on many young lives in Philadelphia, and potentially across the country, as its successes in Philadelphia can be modeled and replicated in other cities. The Greater & Greener gathering of park leaders provides the ideal venue for sharing innovative solutions for challenges facing parks in 2022.”
“The project will undoubtedly make a positive impact on many young lives in Philadelphia, and potentially across the country, as its successes in Philadelphia can be modeled and replicated in other cities.”
Photo by Joe O'Connor/Philadelphia Parks and Recreation
Catherine Nagel, Executive Director of City Parks Alliance, added, “The Fairmount Park Organic Recycling Center exemplifies urban park innovation by leveraging resources to produce multiple benefits simultaneously, from environmental resiliency to workforce development, and shows how urban parks can help cities address their most pressing issues through creative, community-driven approaches.”
Turf Equipment and Supply Company, Inc., Toro’s local representative in the Philadelphia market, played a key role in choosing the organic recycling center as the winner. “The innovative project provides many benefits, including changing production from commodities like wood chips and mulch, into high-value merchantable lumber that can be used in park projects or turned into revenue to fund natural lands restoration,” said Lance Ernst, Vice President, Turf Equipment and Supply Company.
Philadelphia Parks & Recreation has seen the intake volume of wood waste increase tenfold due to climate change storm impacts, aging trees, and invasive species, creating a major management challenge for the city.
An example of a project from the Urban Wood Design Competition used at Philadelphia's recreation pool centers.
In response, PPR began periodically milling portions of the accumulating wood by contracting a sawyer and portable mill for several days a year, with the resulting lumber deployed to park improvement projects such as new bookshelves, cubbies, garden beds, benches, footbridges, kiln-dried firewood and more.
Many of these projects have been accomplished through collaboration with youth-driven organizations such as PowerCorpsPHL and Tiny WPA. PPR began branding these finished products around the new tagline of “Neighborhood Wood.”
Despite early successes, PPR faced challenges with their Neighborhood Wood initiative, including improper storage of finished materials and insufficient capacity to manage a robust program of salvage, evaluation, and production at the highest value.
The $50,000 grant will allow PPR to create a long-term organization and storage system to protect milled lumber and critical equipment from the elements and sustain and grow the program through successful community partnerships.
The Fairmount Park Organic Recycling Center (ORC) recycles an average of 6,000 tons of organic waste into usable products each year. These products, including wood chips, mulch, compost, and firewood, are used by contractors, park friends groups, municipal operating departments, community organizations, and city residents in all manner and scope of projects.
“The Toro prize is helping Parks & Rec realize a long-term vision to produce lumber from the beautiful trees that fall in Philadelphia’s urban forest each year. We are so excited to use this prize to transform how we re-use park wood into cost-saving and revenue-generating solutions that encourage entrepreneurship and an appreciation for our natural lands,” said Kathryn Ott Lovell, Commissioner, Philadelphia Parks & Recreation.
Greater & Greener is designed to have a positive impact on the host cities, and the Toro Urban Park Innovation Award will help to ensure that Philadelphia enjoys a lasting, tangible impact for years to come.
Visit these links for more information about the Fairmount Park Organic Recycling Center and the Urban Wood Design Competition in Philadelphia.
For more information, read our press release here and contact Karen Nozik (knozik@cityparksalliance.org).
