The heat's off: $50K grant to plant trees in Byram

The town of Greenwich was just awarded a grant of nearly $50,000 from CT-DEEP's Trees for Communities Grant Program to plant trees in the Byram neighborhood of Western Greenwich. The project, entitled Byram Branches, aims to plant trees on both town property and private property in the Byram to increase the urban tree canopy.

The Greenwich Department of Environmental Affairs were responsible for obtaining this grant. The program will be administered by the Greenwich Parks & Recreation Department. It is expected to target the 2026 Spring planting season and there will be public outreach about it.

The Greenwich Tree Conservancy (GTC) has also secured state funding under the Urban Forestry Climate Change Grants Program to plant trees in Pemberwick, Byram and Chickahominy to help mitigate the urban heat island effect and prevent flooding.

The GTC has recently planted hundreds of trees along Route1/East Putnam Avenue under a public-private partnership with the town. The GTC has also planted trees in many parking lots including William Street (Central Greenwich), Henry Street (Byram), Bruce Park and East Elm. Their school campus plantings recently included Glenville School. You can contact GTC here.

You can look up the trees near you, using this interesting Greenwich tree tracker website here.

Between the Lines: Now let's bury the poles and wires while they are planting the trees and we will have a win-win for Byram.

Story here