Why Not Fruit Trees?
On public streets, I mean. If municipalities are going to plant and trim trees anyway it would seem smart to plant the kind that bear apples or oranges or avocados or peaches or nectarines, right? The fruit could be available to any member of the public that wanted to pick it. Hey, access to fresh fruit in poor communities? Jobless entrepreneurs selling produce on the corner? Sounds good to me!
Is there some reason this is a bad idea?
“Is there some reason this is a bad idea?”
Aside from being a Madison scholar, my mother is also an expert on street trees. What she would tell you is that among the facts that go into choosing a street tree is how easily whatever it is that the trees drop can be dealt with, making fruit trees a poor choice.
This is in large measure a bandwidth problem. In any given year, all the fruit on a given variety will ripen more or less at the same time. Agra-business’s ability to deal with this bandwidth problem – from the labor needed to harvest fruit, through processing, storage, and distribution – is one of the miracles of the modern age.
OTOH, I remember being in the Pelenque ruins in Southern Mexico, and there were untented orange and avacado trees. Because of the number of people who passed through, not only was all the low-hanging fruit gone, but so were the low limbs. If you wanted an avocado, you had to climb up rather high, and rather far out onto spindly branches.
The fall nearly broke my shoulder, but the fruit was buttery smooth and perfectly ripe. Completely worth it!
— Tony Comstock · Sep 30, 05:55 PM · #
-Rotten/ gross fruit on the tree looks ugly
-Rotten fruit in the street / falling onto cars
-100000 babies dying from polluted/poisoned fruit
— Rowsdower · Sep 30, 06:17 PM · #
What Tony and Rowsdower said.
Connor this is one of those cases where you might have wanted to write the post then think about it for a while before posting:-)
— eric k · Sep 30, 06:26 PM · #
As yet I am unconvinced. When I lived in Seville there weren’t oranges littering the streets, though orange trees flanked all the main boulevards, and you couldn’t even eat those oranges.
Fruit falling on cars would be a problem on some streets, but I don’t think fruit trees should be planted everywhere, just lots of places — and gradually, to make sure the fruit is getting used.
And babies dying from poisoned or polluted fruit? That’s just ridiculous.
— Conor Friedersdorf · Sep 30, 06:34 PM · #
Despite the obvious objections (and the less obvious ones, such as the prediction that “one hundred thousand babies will die”), this is still a good idea (perhaps not good in every context, but certainly one with merit). People may whine about the stink from the fruits dropping off a female ginkgo, and they might occasionally get on your shoe, but they’re not really a serious problem.
Those who are inclined to suggest that the idea is intrinsically absurd ought to be aware that (a) growing fruit trees in urban areas is a common practice historically (particularly common in places influenced by Middle Eastern culture — such as Seville) and (b) there are organizations in the US doing exactly that right now (see fallen fruit (Los Angeles) or the Portland fruit tree project, for example).
— rob · Sep 30, 06:39 PM · #
How are things going with you and Troy, Rowsdower?
— Tom_Meyer · Sep 30, 06:45 PM · #
Conor,
It’s an interesting idea. But there are a number of reasons, in addition to the hassle of the fruit itself, why it’s not generally pursued:
(1) Hardiness: Most trees planted along thoroughfares are selected for their ability to survive and thrive in tough conditions. They’re subjected to air pollution, to extremely salty runoff in wintertime, to the accumulated acidity of thousands of canine tributes, to the abuse of passing cars and pedestrians, and a host of other hazards. Some trees do well in these conditions; most fruit trees don’t, at least in part because they’ve been carefully bred for very different conditions.
(2) Powerlines: Yes, really. It doesn’t apply in those cities in which the lines run through underground conduits. But fruit trees tend to be relatively short, and to branch out in all directions. Many favored trees – think of the majestic elm – mature to have long straight trunks that send out their first branches well above the height of powerlines. Pruning low-lying limbs is a major expense, and when the limbs break, they can take the lines down with them.
(3) Shape: In addition to the concern about powerlines, most trees are planted along sidewalks, with buildings along one side, and trafficked roads along the other. They need to grow upward. Those fruit trees that do get planted – the Bradford Pear springs to mind – tend to grow upward more than outward.
(4) Shade and light: Not every street is fit to host an orchard.
(5) Maintenance: Most commercial cultivars need to be carefully tended and pruned to yield their bounty. That’s expensive. Left alone, they produce dramatically less fruit, minimizing the benefits.
None of which rules out your idea, though these factors do complicate it. So let me offer an alternative proposal – why not plant such trees much more aggressively in our parks? Why don’t we have ‘community orchards,’ parallel to the movement for ‘community gardens’? Volunteers could prune and tend to the trees. They’d provide shade in the summer. Most of the objections to planting such trees along streets are irrelevant when the same tree is planted in a public park.
— Cynic · Sep 30, 06:48 PM · #
Not intrinsically absurd, but fruit trees exhibit almost none of the characteristics that are valued in street trees, especially around issues of maintenance. Growing fruit trees in urban areas might be a historical practice, but then people traveling on foot and eating fruit with various pest infestation was a historical practice too.
— Tony Comstock · Sep 30, 06:52 PM · #
Fruit flies/gnats. There’s already plenty of those suckers in the city. The fewer the better.
— Sonny Bunch · Sep 30, 07:23 PM · #
Cynic and Sonny,
Now those are objections!
My revised position: fruit tree parks!
— Conor Friedersdorf · Sep 30, 07:34 PM · #
My revised position: fruit tree parks!
Just bear in mind that without (possibly substantial) due diligence, being in pubic parks is going to (likely) cause those trees to take a form that is not especially conducive to picking fruit; ie it wasn’t the cost of buying the tractors that was the problem, it was the cost of maintaining them.
How about a nice apiary project?
— Tony Comstock · Sep 30, 07:39 PM · #
I think Conor’s absolutely right. I live in a place where there are lime and orange trees everywhere, and the rotten fruit factor is nil. There’s no more fruit flies than in the States. I’ve never heard of anyone’s car or head getting cracked with falling fruit. And the positives aren’t life altering, but they are nice: there’s always some limes within a 30-second walk to freshen up a beer or a plate of tacos, oranges for eating or marinating meat. It’s not a reason to move to foreign land, but it’s quite a bonus.
— pc · Sep 30, 08:06 PM · #
“ I live in a place where there are lime and orange trees everywhere, and the rotten fruit factor is nil.”
Neverminding that citrus won’t grow in most of the US how do factors like car ownership/dependance and poverty compare with a place like Denver?
— Tony Comstock · Sep 30, 08:12 PM · #
I think it’s a fine idea. I’m back in the South now, but I spent 6 years in Berkeley. There were a couple of Mayer (sp?) lemon trees near me on the sidewalk. Loved em, and they didn’t seem to cause any problems. Unlike the Awfulberry™ tree that I parked my motorcycle under.
— BethanyAnne · Sep 30, 08:40 PM · #
Although I intrinsically like this idea, it would not work for some kinds of fruit trees. I used to rent a house with an apple tree, and every year when the (pretty lousy) fruit ripened, rotted and fell, there were drunken wasps all over the place for quite awhile. That was in Virginia; maybe further up north the weather would turn cold quickly enough to minimize the wasp problem.
My infant and toddler were never remotely tempted by those windfalls, incidentally. Where does rowsdower live, that there are thousands of babies crawling around on the streets? I would definitely pay money to see this.
— DRK · Sep 30, 09:22 PM · #
Apples, pears, peaches, and plums are lots messier than oranges and limes and are much more susceptible to insect infestations. If you don’t spray heavily, you are unlikely to get one undamaged fruit.
Also, in the Oregon area himalaya blackberries grow wild and very few people pick them. Most treat them as a weed species to be eradicated.
However, I like the idea of fruit parks (or of spending the same amount of money to subsidize local growers)—not because I think they serve an immediate need or would any way be useful, but because I think our country is dramatically unprepared for disaster. Local agriculture is a cushion.
Oh, yeah, drunken wasps. Also drunken honeybees, june bugs, and japanese beetles.
Also, most commercial varieties of temperate fruit trees are pretty short-lived. The non-commercial varieties are larger and more robust, but they can actually pose a hazard to passersby. An apple falling from 30 feet is serious business.
— Adam Greenwood · Sep 30, 11:08 PM · #
Me and those Oregon blackberry thickets go way back!
We don’t spray our trees, but we don’t mind eating around what the worms and other pest claim as their own; the trees still make more than we can eat, even with the bugs taking a share.
It’s not that I’m opposed to boulevards lined with lemon trees. It sounds absolutely marvelous! A temperate city filled with apples and peaches would be lovely too. But coming up with a way to do it that would be (as the popular phrases goes) revenue nuetral would be no small trick. I reckon it would be a massive social engineering project, and while I might support its aims, a massive social engineering project doesn’t sound especially conservative, does it?
New York has some very nice community gardens. This one is right around the block from our apartment. What I find interesting is how these gardens make sure that keyholders are also stakeholders. One might argue that’s what the attempted expansion of home ownership was an attempt to achieve. Well you know, cart, horse, baby, bathwater; not to mention those goddam tractors. Prolly time to re-watch Deadwood. Again, apiary project anyone?
Don’t give up, Conor! I fully support all efforts to try and make the world a nicer place. I’m going to try to make my world a nicer place by moving somewhere where citrus trees will grow and bear fruit. Lesson there too, I think.
Also, if you write something smart/thoughtful/interesting/amusing, consider giving us a link. I’d love to be able to learn more about you.
— Tony Comstock · Sep 30, 11:34 PM · #
Yeah, yeah. I was being a little silly with “babies dying from poisoned fruit”, but I was refering to all the attendant “safe food panic” that would likely rule out the “fresh fruit for the poor” and especially the “entrepreneur selling fruit” idea.
The lime idea does sound awesome, though.
Troy’s fine!
— Rowsdower · Oct 1, 12:21 AM · #
if you plant a Banyan tree, it could turn into several. no fruits though and that investment takes some time to mature.
— Nayagan · Oct 1, 02:07 AM · #
Why not grow barley and have free community beer?
— Kristoffer V. Sargent · Oct 1, 04:34 AM · #
“Why not grow barley and have free community beer?”
This thread made me reminisce about listening to my uncle piss and moan about the hippy kids panhandling in New York in the sixties – “Spare change, man?” and “Food ought to be free, cause, you know, it just grows, man.”
I’m sure that’s not what Conor meant; or Sanjay either. But you know how it is. We all have our triggers.
— Tony Comstock · Oct 1, 11:25 AM · #
Carmen Miranda eat your heart out
— ell · Oct 1, 02:13 PM · #
The low hanging fruit will go quickly, of course, but the high perched fruit will almost certainly result in injury as surly foragers climb to the upper decks and fall off. This may only happen 1 in 1000 times, but there is almost no doubt that there would be some injury from trying to grab fruits that are out of reach.
Community strife is easy enough to envision with folks hoarding or pulling down fruit before it is ripe and thus depriving others of said fruit.
Finally, at least in my neighborhood, the street fruit peddlers would be harmed financially. I’m all for fruit trees in general, and there’s a good chance that in certain neighborhoods your proposal would be sound. But since you asked, this is my 2 cents on potential problems. D
— D-Blog · Oct 1, 08:20 PM · #