Camden nonprofit plans to keep bus riders cool with shade and pollinator gardens

That was before the New Jersey Tree Foundation and Neighborhood Collaborative Community Gardens planted cherry trees along her sidewalk. “I can actually sit out there now,” said Lopez, a program assistant with Neighborhood Collaborative Community Gardens. The nonprofit Neighborhood Collaborative Community Gardens plans to spread this shade to more parts of Camden next summer by building four “blooming bus stops” throughout the city. These vegetated bus shelters will include shade trees, flowering plants and painted pergolas, said Jacqueline M. Santiago-Vicente, executive director of Neighborhood Collaborative Community Gardens. Fighting the urban heat island effect in CamdenNeighborhood Collaborative Community Gardens’ bus shelter project is funded by a grant from the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities for reducing the urban heat island effect in overburdened municipalities.