Every human produces a little more than 4.5 ounces of excrement per day. Multiplied by the 2.2 million customers of the Philadelphia Water Department’s wastewater system, the cumulative daily dump equals about 620,811 pounds, or about 310 tons. The story of biosolids (treated sewage sludge) starts with clean water in the toilet bowls of the
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Melvin Powell spends most of his days at a vibrant greenspace and community center in North Philadelphia, a backyard garden surrounded by tall walls filled with graffiti art. Community members gather at the outdoor venue for neighborhood events like concerts and art-inspired showcases. “It was a converted gas station that was basically just an empty
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I’m bidding for a piece of my childhood. That feeling is something that … can be traumatizing. People are losing a part of themselves.” — Michael Gonzalo Moran, Iglesias Gardens board member When a notice went up in 2015 announcing that a lot his mother had tended as a vegetable garden since the 1990s would
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On march 19, 2019, Mom, the red-tailed hawk matriarch of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, disappeared. A post by Carolyn Sutton on the Franklin Hawkaholics Facebook page described how, over the previous weekend, Mom had been looking unwell, sitting listlessly on a branch and showing no interest in a dead rat delivered by her mate, T4
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On June 22, the following letter was sent by email to Mayor Jim Kenney, Parks & Recreation, members of City Council, Commissioner Kathryn Ott Lovell and their respective staff. It was also hand delivered on June 20 to Ott Lovell. It is a response to various problems identified within the FDR Park Plan, completed in
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Does the thought of drinking toxic chemicals that linger in your body and in the environment for decades freak you out? Well, good news: the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has lowered the recommended limits for two types of “forever chemicals” (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances or PFAS) and created limits for two others. PFAS
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I’m one of the last to arrive, which means the full spectacle of the protest hits me at once as I come around the bend. A crowd of 150 people holding banners and signs surrounds a massive inflatable of CEO Tim Buckley on the lawn in front of the Malvern headquarters of Vanguard. The likeness
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The full opening of the Martin Luther King Jr. Drive bridge over the Schuylkill River has again been pushed later, this time to 2025. The bridge, which connects MLK Drive through Fairmount Park West to the Eakins Oval, has been closed since 2020 as part of a project to make repairs to the bridge’s structure,
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Black Birders Week 2022 was celebrated from May 31 to June 5. This year Grid caught up with three local Black birders to hear their stories. Katrina Clark I started birding during the pandemic. Mostly a friend and I were walking. We were like, “We have to get out of the house.” We started walking
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Much of the opposition to the FDR Park Master Plan centers on the replacement of the open greenspace of the Meadows with the artificial green of 12 synthetic turf athletic fields. Master Plan boosters cite the “playability” of synthetic turf fields, which can host more hours of play per week than natural grass fields. Recent
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Like many American cities, Philadelphia is built on land that wants to be wet. Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) Park sits in a particularly soggy corner, right at the junction where the Schuylkill River rushes into the Delaware. The park is perforated by several lakes and water channels, and flooding regularly renders pedestrian walkways impassible. Over
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