The Urban Ecosystem

It's amazing what a few tall trees or a little strip of wildflowers will do.

One thing I write about a lot is this trail system near by house in Cleveland. But it really changed my life.

I used to be grumpy all the time. One reason is, I’ve been a commuter cyclist for about 20 years. For 11 years I didn’t own my own car.

Anyway, every day I was always almost getting killed out there by some sociopath with a car. Then, quite unexpectedly, from my perspective anyway, my city build this amazing trail system. Well, really, it wasn’t a city initiative. It was sorta these two older guys, visionary types, who put the projects together over decades.

They just had this vision for a trail network, that would run along railroads and highways and rivers, parts of the city that had been sort of neglected and overlooked, where there weren’t too many roads, and thus intersections to deal with.

Anyway, the whole time they were doing this, these two guys, I was just living in Cleveland and riding my bike everywhere. And people kept talking about these trail projects, but they just seemed like they would NEVER happen, so I mostly ignored them. Then one day, my friend who is not even a big cyclist invited me to go for a bike ride and took me along the paths and my mind was blown.

Now I bike commute to my office on these trails almost every day. And it’s entirely changed my personality I feel like! Now I’m stupidly happy all the time. Because the whole time on my bike commute, all I see is wildflowers and little bunnies and pretty colorful birds and panoramic views of the city. It is truly nuts.

Anyway, it’s interesting. One thing I notice while riding this trail is, there is a whole ecosystem that has sprung up around it. Now keep in mind this is a trail that literally didn’t exist like 5 years ago. But apparently that doesn't matter. Because smart landscape architects (I love landscape architects) planted all these native wildflowers.

Anyway, I mentioned there’s all kinds of baby bunnies on this trail and cool birds. But there’s also neat insects. Little snails, with curly shells, I had never seen before. Butterflies. It’s a whole goddamn ecosystem.

Right up to this cool thing I saw the other day. I was biking and I saw something up ahead on the trail. Now, I am always scanning for wildlife. And I saw right away that this was something different: too big to be a groundhog, not the right shape to be a deer.

Sure enough, it’s a coyote. I know this coyote, I’ve seen him before, but never this close up. I think he stalks prey — the little bunnies! — right up and down the railroad tracks, which interestingly enough go right past an enormous working steel mill, views of which are one thing that I think makes this trail unique from a national perspective.

Anyway, he/she was pretty close to me and and I was able to get this picture, which immediately after I regretted taking like I was stealing his./her dignity or something by photographing him/her and putting it online. (Sometimes I hate myself and my tendency when I see something amazing to be like, “I gotta make sure Mark Zuckerberg profits from every moment of pure wonder I have in my life.” But regardless…)

Anyway, it blows my mind that we have this entire ecosystem along this trail now, it’s just this tiny green strip, but that’s all it takes apparently! The whole damn food chain just comes out of the woodwork, from the cool bugs and birds all the way up to mammalian predators. 🤯

We think of nature and city as being opposite in our culture. But I think it’s funny, how little it takes even in a city to carve out a space for nature. People and the natural world and co exist. It doesn’t even take that dramatic of a change.

My neighborhood for example, where I live, we have very, very mature trees. A great tree canopy. That’s really all it takes, imo, some mature trees, to again have a functional ecosystem that is so amazing to live around. Every once in a while, a wild Turkey will stroll down my street.

I grew up in a suburban neighborhood that had basically no mature trees. And I remember every year, we’d go stay in a state park cabin in the woods. And waking up to the sound of all these birds and just listening and being kind of wowed.

Well it’s the same feeling in my neighborhood. Just because of the huge trees. In fact, there’s some kind of hawk — a Coopers hawk? — that is nesting in the tree across the street. And look what I came across on the tree lawn.

Those are tufts of fur. I’m just guessing but I bet the hawk killed something there. Again, here we have a whole ecosystem that goes up to predator. I consider that a big success.

I give my neighbors a lot of credit. They are do gooders types. Big gardeners. And they make a point to plant native plants, especially wildflowers. A lot of them have added rain gardens to their front yards too (our sewer district gives you a discount on stormwater if you do that.)

(Roots over the sidewalk, matureass tree in my neighborhood. GAH I love that.)

Anyway, one thing you notice on summer nights now is lightening bugs. Another sign of a healthy ecosystem, and the most magical/loveable thing in the world.

An example of the kind of crazy gardens my neighbors have. That whole thing about taking out lawns and doing front yard gardens, it seems to really work! I’m as shocked as the next person!

It doesn’t take that much. The big thing is overcoming the sense of disbelief that it can happen. I myself, don’t know if I believed in this trail project. And now to see it come to life and just far surpass my expectations, it’s really inspiring.