Toruń – green city

Toruń is covered in greenery. See for yourself. All you need to do is look over the roofs of old tenement houses in any direction and enjoy one of the greenest cities in Poland. Anyone who has visited it must admit that this town has no competition. Urban greenery covers nearly 30 percent of the city: there are mainly woods but also garden plots, areas of urban greenery (parks, commons, small greens, housing estate green areas, private gardens and greenery lining up streets and graveyards). The greenest districts of Toruń are Bielany, Bydgoskie Suburb, Kaszczorek, Rudak and Na Skarpie and Winnica housing estates. Toruń takes pride in its well-kept parks: at Bydgoskie Suburb, at Błonie, Bielany, Jakubskie Suburb, on Bazarowa Islet and at Stawki (The Millennium Park). The green belt around the Old Town of Toruń, the Dream Valley, the Zoological and Botanical Garden, Barbarka – an extensive forest area in the north-eastern part of Toruń – and Bazarowa Islet located on the left bank of the river with its natural reserve of a riparian forest are Toruń’s most interesting and most popular recreational areas. The greenery covering the old fortification system of Toruń Stronghold is of top natural, ecological, recreational and historical value. Forests surround the city, practically, from all directions. They cover an area up to 2.755 (nearly 24% of the area of Toruń).

Bydgoskie Suburb Park is the largest and the oldest green area in Toruń. Set up in 1822, it received its final shape in the 1920s. Its layout is based on regular patterns (flower beds, parterres and a pond) with landscape features such as clusters of trees standing freely and all kinds of groves located among open green squares. Among those features there wind side paths and glisten the surfaces of small ponds. Not far away stretch the riverside commons. The stand of the park is quite impressive in its composition (65 kinds of trees and their varieties and 30 kinds of native and exotic bushes).

Bazarowa Islet is located between the main Vistula riverbed and the so-called Small Vistula. Its green shore is perfectly visible from Philadelphia Boulevard across the river. The natural reserve (established in 1987) covers an area of above 32 ha. The rare riparian willow and poplar forest preserved on the islet is under protection. The forest features tall poplars (47 m tall) and willows (up to 35 m tall), which, together with their rich and varied undergrowth, make up an extremely rich multilayer forest very popular with the people of Toruń and tourists. Bazarowa Islet offers a spectacular view of the panorama of Old Toruń.

Bielany is one of the oldest districts of Toruń separated from the centre by Bielany woods, which is a forested dune belt. A considerable area in this district is covered in coniferous trees, mainly pine, which is xerophilous. The soil is sandy, shaped into characteristic dunes that stretch towards Barbarka.

Barbarka is the most popular among the people of Toruń forest complex located within the city limits. Here you can take a rest after the hassle and bustle of the daily routine. The history of Barbarka goes back to the 13th century. In this small wooded estate there is a pond into which flows the Red Water, a stream that has its source in the Wrzosy district, St. Barbara’s Chapel built in 1842 surrounded by a tiny graveyard from the turn of the 19th and the 20th centuries and a cemetery with graves of victims of the Nazi terror with a commemorative obelisk and thick forests.

Toruń is definitely a green place!