When you think of Brooklyn, New York, your first thought isn’t likely to be about the borough’s beautiful city parks, but Brooklyn is home to a number of lovely parks, including Owl’s Head Park.

The park offers visitors rolling hills, great views of the New York City skyline, a skatepark, and a well-known dog run, but all was not perfect in this beloved city park. Year after year, erosion issues in the park had been causing the city problems.

Not only was the beauty of the park reduced by the erosion, but soil runoff onto nearby sidewalks and roadways was causing issues with mud for Brooklyn. In addition, the erosion was causing the water treatment plant directly across from the park to work harder to accomplish its task.

Even with all of its resources, the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation hadn’t solved the erosion issue.

Enter Eagle Scout James C. from the Boy Scouts of America Greater New York Councils who knew that he could help address the erosion problem in the park.

“I definitely wanted to do something in the park. It’s my favorite place to go and relax,” said the Brooklyn resident.

James, who plans to study engineering when he starts college in the fall, put his Scouting skills and his love of engineering to work to help solve the erosion problem at Owl’s Head Park in Brooklyn.

“My project consists of a terrace on the southern side of Owl’s Head Park, built to stop dirt from coming down onto the sidewalk,” he said. “Next to the terraces, grass pods were added to add roots to the soil, further stopping the erosion. In addition, the tree pits in the area were dug out about two inches to clear out the excess soil in the pits. As a side addition project, a small portion of the park was dug out so that it could be used as a garden in the future.”

He also talked about the value of Scouting for youth growing up in urban environments like Brooklyn.

“Having the opportunity to be outdoors and not be in [an] urban setting is a nice change, hanging out with friends, and being in tents and eating outdoors and gaining skills is great,” he said. “Those are my favorite memories.”

To learn more about James’ Eagle Scout project, be sure to read the full article in the Brooklyn Reporter.

To learn more about the positive impact that Scouting can have on young people like James, be sure to check out this article on the recent Tufts study, and watch this video: