City, Greening partner on tree nursery at Rouge Park

The City of Detroit and the Greening of Detroit are working together on the Walter Meyers Tree Nursery at Rouge Park. The goal is to plant 20,000 trees in the city within eight years.

The nursery is 125 acres and has been unused for the last seven years. Greening hopes to one day provide trees to all of its plantings from the nursery, says operations manager Jill Katakowski. "This is going to make our organization so much more sustainable," she says. "We can do much much more when we are in full control of our trees."

Greening is still working on a master plan for the nursery that will spell out how many trees of which varieties to plant, but Katakowski estimates that it will take three to five years to build it up to full capacity.

Source: Jill Katakowski, Greening of Detroit
Writer: Kelli B. Kavanaugh