Author:
Green Steps
Short summary:
Hi! I am Evine, I live in Vienna and joined Green Steps in July. In this article, I will tell you about my experience with Green Steps so far and my project of creating a nature (BFG) route in Vienna, which is now available for everyone to walk!
Hi! I am Evine, 23 years old and I come from the Netherlands. I study and live in Vienna since September 2023 and joined Green Steps at the beginning of July. I commute to St. Pölten around three times a week and am really enjoying it so far!
The main focus of July was on testing the Big Friendly Giant (BFG) routes that were already created in the ARK and preparing for the summer camp that took place in August. My role was to provide feedback and report mistakes on the one hand, and come up with ideas for activities during the summer camp. Walking the routes taught me more about nature and gave me some ideas and inspiration to create my own route in Vienna. Additionally, I got to know the area of St. Pölten better and the other volunteers at Green Steps, which has been really nice!
My personal project and focus has been to create a BFG walk in Vienna. This was really fun to do as I got to explore the city in which I’m living in and got to know it better! As Vienna is quite a big city I first spent some time walking around and coming up with ideas for the walk and which areas it should cover. Then, I invited the other volunteers to come over to map the trees together. After that, it was time to get behind the computer and put all the required information together on the ARK, both in English and in German. I came up with questions that relate to either the natural or the cultural element of the trees. By doing that, I hope it is a fun walk to do for everyone! The final step included walking it another time with the volunteers to check for mistakes and get feedback, after which it got available for everyone to walk!
The route I created is in the city centre of Vienna, in the first district. It starts at the Karl Lueger Platz, guides you through the highlights of Stadtpark, and has a stop at the Karlskirche, which is one of my personal favourite churches of the city. It continues alongside the Ringstraße where you can see some of the highlights of Vienna, like the State Opera building, Burggarten and Maria-Theresienplatz. The route finishes at Rathausplatz, where the beautiful City Hall is located. Along the walk, you’ll stop at 11 diverse trees. My favourite tree on the walk is the Caucasian Wingnut. With its multiple trunks, it is a very impressive tree and stands on a very nice location in Stadtpark. It was planted only 100 years ago and has been protected since 1941. If you’re interested to walk this BFG route, you can find it through this link: https://ark.greensteps.me/commons/wien/route/bfg-vienna-ring
It was fun to put my creativity into designing this route, learn more about the city, and think about what would be interesting for others to learn. I had to decide which locations would fit the route, which trees did I want to include and which information I wanted to convey.
I hope you will walk this route if you get the chance when you’re in Vienna so you can discover more of Vienna’s nature and culture!
