The Trinity Park Foundation, garden upkeep and the Blossom Garden Club
The Trinity Park Foundation is the neighborhood’s non-profit 501(c)(3) charitable entity. It was formed in 1980 to purchase the land at the corner of Watts St. and West Trinity Ave. that is now known as The Trinity Park. Its founders wanted it to be a place of recreation for people of all ages. They wanted to maintain the “tot lot,” as the mostly-vacant lot with a slide and sandbox was then known, but they also wanted plenty of benches, walkways, and gardens which would appeal to adults as well.
The garden areas and trees that border the park along Watts and Trinity provide a green buffer from the street, creating a beautiful, fragrant, and relaxing setting. The gardens were greatly enhanced in 2005 when the Trinity Park Foundation received a matching grant from the Durham Open Space and Trails Commission, with the Foundation promising to maintain the gardens.
For the past 17 years, the gardens in the park have been maintained by a group of dedicated volunteers known as the Blossom Garden Club. These women hold several park workdays a year and take turns watering the park in the summer. Over the years, they have ordered truckloads of mulch and compost and spread it themselves. This fall, they scouted local nurseries for drought-tolerant native plants, purchased them, and planted them. Many of them do not even live in the neighborhood but give their time nonetheless!
With the average age of the Club’s members rising into the 70s, the Trinity Park Foundation intends to support the Club’s ongoing efforts in the park gardens by installing 1) an irrigation system, and 2) decorative short fencing to protect the plantings from being trampled by dogs and people cutting through the gardens to enter the park.
