Harlem's 18,000 Trees Are Mapped By Parks Department: Check Them Out

HARLEM, NY — Ever wished you could learn more about the towering oak trees on Striver's Row, or the formidable elm on the north side of Marcus Garvey Park? It's never been easier, thanks to a new Parks Department map.

The interactive NYC Tree Map, was launched by the city last month, allowing New Yorkers to poke around for information about the more than 800,000 landscaped trees in parks and on sidewalks across the five boroughs.

A similar map of street trees had already been available, but the new version includes 150,000 newly mapped trees within city parks, creating a comprehensive view of each neighborhood's leafy canopy.

Clicking on a dot that represents an individual tree shows details like its species, trunk diameter, and history of pruning and inspections. Across Harlem, a combined 18,556 trees are viewable on the map.

That includes the huge, gnarled American elm behind Marcus Garvey Park's northwest playground along 124th Street, whose trunk measures 57 inches in diameter. The old giant was last inspected by a forester in Aug. 2020, when it also had a hanging limb removed, the map shows.

Further uptown, a 33-inch-wide London planetree stands in the median of Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. Boulevard at the corner of West 136th Street. And in Sugar Hill, a 47-inch-wide willow oak takes up the southwest corner of Convent Garden, the triangular green space on Convent Avenue and West 151st Street.

The map can also be filtered by trunk diameter or species. Searching for cherry trees, for example, shows clusters of dots in St. Nicholas Park, whose canopy erupts with bright pink blossoms each spring.

Harlem has no shortage of trees to peruse: as Patch reported in 2021, the neighborhood gained more tree coverage since 2010 than any other place in New York City, according to a study by the Nature Conservancy.

Other tree facts included in the Parks map include ecological benefits, such as the gallons of stormwater intercepted and tons of carbon dioxide reduced by each tree annually.

"Our New York City trees provide countless benefits to the city and residents – they provide the air we breathe, help to keep temperatures down, and manage flood waters," Deputy Mayor for Operations Meera Joshi said in a news release about the new map.

"The NYC Tree Map highlights the value of these natural resources and allows New Yorkers to report trees in need of care."

Check out the tree map online here.

Related coverage: Harlem Gained More Tree Coverage Than Any NYC Neighborhood: Study