My Urban Oasis

Finding Gardening Space in the Parking Place

backyard space, beginnings of a fern grotto under the tree

I live on the second floor of a multi-family home, a three-decker, an historical, New England style of housing that I describe here:

The Triple Decker

Pretty much every house on the street is a triple-decker. So, three “families” in each house plus two cars for most families equals six cars crammed into tiny backyards and narrow driveways. The city does not allow overnight parking on the street, and has a 2-hour street parking limit during the day. A person whose job description at one time would have been “meter maid”, cruises the neighborhood in a city police vehicle ticketing parking violators. As you can imagine, parking is at a premium, so most of the backyards are totally paved over to provide parking spaces for residents.

Most of the triple-deckers on my street are rental properties. The driveways are of cracked concrete or rutted asphalt. Our triple-decker is actually a condominium set-up, with three separate owners. We each own from “the walls in” of our own floor, while the front and back stairs, the basement, and the yard are common…