TEDC Associate Director Victoria Marshall Creates Garden Space for Post-Sandy Areas

Victoria Marshall, Assistant Professor of Urban Design at Parsons and Associate Director at the Tishman Environment and Design Center, and her organization, Till Design, worked in partnership with Beach 41st Houses, NYCHA, the US Forest Service, along with key support from NYC Parks, NYRP, Natural Garden Landscape, and the TKF Foundation to re-establish "old habits and haunts" as well as envision new ones for the Beach 41st houses in Rockaway, Queens, an area damaged from Hurricane Sandy.These organizations worked together to create "The Workshop Garden," which has 30 existing community gardens plots and their gardeners, as well as a basketball court and the players, dogs and their owners, kids and their parents, and fishermen with great music. The new garden elements are a pergola, vegetated beds, and benches that afford an environment where these people might come together. The garden is currently under construction and will be completed in summer 2016.Volunteers are welcome to participate in planting these gardens. The Beach 41st Community Planting Day will be Saturday May 21, at 9 AM - 5 PM.Workshop Garden is part of a larger research project, titled Landscapes of Resilience. The researchers are documenting the creation, restoration, and transformation of open spaces in post-Sandy affected areas – in particular the Workshop Garden in its locality as well as the networks of people that support and care for the Rockaway peninsular.