Adopt a tree pit

Planting little gardens around trees along your street can perk up your neighbourhood enormously. In addition, this is the perfect way to prevent the area around a tree from being used as a dog toilet, garbage can, or bicycle parking spot. Tree pit gardens also stimulate contact between neighbours. On this page, you can learn how to get some tree pit gardens started along your street.

What is a tree pit garden?

Do you long for more green in your direct surroundings, but have no garden? In that case, a tree pit garden might be the perfect solution! These gardens are created in the little plots of earth around urban street trees. These are often the places where trash and dog poop collect. You are also encouraged to plant up these tree gardens, either alone or as a community project.

What are the benefits of tree pit gardens?

Tree pit gardens can provide a lot of extra green in the city within an extremely small plot of land. Here are some more good reasons to plant tree pit gardens:

• Creating green in the neighbourhood brings people together and makes extra room for nature in the city.
  Tree gardens bring atmosphere, life and colour to the street.
• Research shows that living amongst green is good for peoples’ health: people exposed to nature feel better in general and are less frequently sick.
• The local biodiversity value of your neighbourhood will be increased, as the plants in the tree gardens in turn attract creatures, butterflies and birds.
• Weeds are kept at bay in a tree pit garden, and dog poop becomes less of a problem.
• You, as well as the children in the neighbourhood, will get a lot of pleasure from taking care of your tree pit garden.

How do you adopt a tree pit?

You can request a sidewalk garden from the Amsterdam South city district office at any time during the year. Simply fill in the digital tree pit adoption application form.

Construction and maintenance

All of the necessary information about the construction and maintenance of a tree pit garden can be found on the www.buurtboomtuin.nl website. Here you will find information about which plants are appropriate for your plot, and which you should avoid. For example, deep-rooting varieties and plants with large root structures are not appropriate for tree pits, due to the limited room between the tree roots. When choosing plants, the health of the tree always comes first.