By the Philadelphia Climate Justice Collective (Mantua Civic Association, SEAMAAC, Overbrook Environmental Education Center, Esperanza, and The Environmental Collaboratory at Drexel University) Philadelphia is heating up — and too many of our neighbors can’t escape it. In parts of North, West and South Philadelphia, summer temperatures can soar 20 degrees higher than in greener, wealthier
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Philadelphia is facing a silent crisis: the rapid loss of its urban tree canopy. Over the past decade, we’ve lost at least 7% of our trees—shade-giving, air-cleaning, life-enhancing sentinels that shape the character of our city. The benefits of trees are indisputable. They cool our neighborhoods, lowering summertime heat indexes by as much as 22
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Over the past year, Philadelphia has received over $21 million in federal funding to expand its electric vehicle charging network. EV ownership has boomed in the city — the number of registrations increased from 475 in 2018 to 5,870 in 2023, according to PennDOT — but there are too few charging stations to meet demand.
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Darling Damselfly, a Philadelphia-based band, wants their most recent album, “Galapagos,” to get listeners thinking about humankind’s relationship with the planet — in the hopes of saving it. “Being able to have a better understanding and appreciation of the wonder of [the environment] can help us be more connected and want to work harder to
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PHILADELPHIA — Even though the Phillies fell far short of their goal to win the World Series in 2024, their home runs are impacting the city in a very green way. Home Runs for Trees, a 13-years-and-counting partnership between Asplundh, the Phillies organization and the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society (PHS), plants one tree in the Greater
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Let the end-of-the-negotiations parade begin. The Please Touch Museum and its unionized workforce have finalized their first collective bargaining agreement, marking a significant step for the institution’s employees. After 16 months of negotiations, workers with Please Touch Museum United (PTMU) voted on Sunday, November 24, to ratify the contract, solidifying their membership in the American
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As the 13 weeks of Mayor Parker’s block clean-up plan came to an end and another is set to begin, I was incredibly disappointed with the Mayor’s press conference on the subject last month. She touted the impact of so many thousands of blocks cleaned with no real context as to how many needed to
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The Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice at Texas Southern University offers training for students and community leaders, conducts community-based participatory research, provides information for public officials, and serves as a hub for networking and technical assistance and grantmaking for universities and communities. The center was founded by Robert D. Bullard, a sociologist known
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Among the many reporting experiences accumulated in my 13-year career as a journalist, a walk in Philadelphia’s John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge in 2022 stands out as one of the most memorable. I was invited there by various leaders from the Black birding community, who were in town to celebrate the 3rd Annual Black Birders
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As a Philly bicycle commuter, it’s long been my dream to race through the city slapping tickets on all the cars parked in the bike lanes. In the eyes of bikers, many of the everyday users of city streets — delivery trucks, contractor vans, Ubers picking up and depositing passengers, even residents dropping off groceries
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After three years of planning and several unexpected delays, Weavers Way Co-op celebrated the opening of their new Germantown location with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Friday. “I’ve been crying for two days, tears of joy,” says Jon Roesser, General Manager of Weavers Way. “It’s amazing the way the community has been so welcoming to us.
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