Tags: discovery week

Explore the native grasslands, restored wetlands, and natural woodlands of South Mound at Freshkills Park like never before.  This video leads you through a 2.5 mile loop through the back hills of South Mound, virtually on foot! 

Before there was the Draft Master plan in 2001, South Mound was the first of 4 mounds capped in 1996. 

Each year at Discovery Days and during Transportation Alternative’s annual Staten Island Bike The Boros event, thousands of people ride bikes around Freshkills Park’s East Mound.

Join us to explore the grasslands of East Park on this virtual bike ride that takes you on a 3.5 mile loop.

Join us for a kayak tour on Freshkills Creek. See the shoreline grasses and mounds of Freshkills Park and experience the water while someone else paddles!

Support the Freshkills Park Alliance

Return to Discovery Week @ Home

For your next movie night, check out the Freshkills FreshFlicks staff picks. Take a trip down memory lane with a Fresh Perspective, with films that are just as environmentally relevant today!

Explore different environmental topics by clicking on the titles in our queue.

Coloring books are not only a fun activity for your younger ones, but beneficial to an audience of all age ranges. For older folk, this activity allows for the fear and stress center in the brains to relax. For the younger crowds, coloring pages can help develop fine motor skills.

In the Summer of 2019, Freshkills Park researchers set up wildlife cameras to record animal activity on site, in hopes of capturing footage of the red foxes that call the former landfill home. The camera footage shows a snapshot of some of the larger mammals that inhabit the park, with a few surprise guests!

Make your own kinetic paper animals with Deborah from MakerSpace NYC! How many things can you make from paper? From just one piece of copy paper, you can create a flying animal. Cut pieces and adhere them together so you can manipulate the wings of a paper bird, dinosaur – or any animal you can imagine!

Moth Painting is a time-based painting-photography hybrid that serves as a visual record of the moth and insect population of Freshkills Park. Artist Ash Ferlito suspended a large sheet from a plastic framework and then shined UV light on the material to attract insects on the panel to document them.

Join artist James Powers for a plein-air drawing lesson on North Mound looking out at Main Creek and the William T. Davis Wildlife Refuge. James is the artist and instructor behind Fastnet, a 20-foot shipping container that he outfitted as a gallery and outdoor drawing studio from which he teaches landscape drawing workshops at Freshkills Park.

Join Mr. Ted Nabavi, Director of Waste Management Engineering at DSNY, for a behind-the-scenes tour of the Fresh Kills Landfill Leachate Treatment Plant. Leachate, a landfill by-product, is created when water seeps through solid waste. Leachate treatment includes biological and chemical treatment to remove harmful constituents so the treated water can be safely discharged.

Your next online meeting can happen at Freshkills Park! Download the images below to virtually visit the waterways, grasslands, and sweeping vistas of Freshkills Park.

How to add a virtual background to Zoom:

1. Click on the images below to open the full-size image in a new tab.

Welcome to Discovery Week!

There are so many different ways to Discover Freshkills Park and this week we hope you will find out about some that are new for you.  By way of a quick introduction, we have posted a series of three videos that provide a snapshot of what Freshkills Park is and what it is becoming as it continues to develop. 

Join us for a special tour of the construction at North Park Phase 1, the first Freshkills Park project to be built within the former Fresh Kills Landfill boundary. See the progress on building the bird tower and the wetland observation deck as well as the spectacular views of Main Creek.

At 2,200 acres, Freshkills Park is almost three times the size of Central Park and the largest park to be developed in New York City in over 100 years. It also has a significant history as the site of the Fresh Kills Landfill, which was the largest landfill in the world before closing in 2001.

This year Freshkills Park has taken Discovery Day virtual and is excited to host activities and experiences created by the Freshkills Park team and community partners. Near or far, join us for our first “Discovery Week @ Home.”  Throughout the week, learn more about the history, wildlife, recreation, education, and art at the park through virtual experiences.