SAN ANTONIO Each year, millions of people visit the San Antonio River Walk, enjoying its restaurants, bars, hotels and shops. With so much going on, visitors can miss the trees in a forest of entertaining distractions.
The horticulture faculty at Texas A&M University has taken steps to help change that. Working with the San Antonio Parks and Recreation Department, the horticulture faculty submitted a nomination to the American Society for Horticultural Science in Washington, D.C., to designate the River Walk a horticultural landmark. The horticulture society agreed.
A plaque commemorating the site as “a magnificent urban ecosystem where man and nature embrace a great engineering work that supports the rich diversity of South Texas plants” was unveiled on July 21 at ceremony on the River Walk.
Dr. Dan Lineberger, a Texas A&M horticulture professor who had the idea of nominating the River Walk for the award, attended the ceremony.
“As a horticulturist, I felt the site deserved to be recognized for the unique beauty of the plants and trees growing there,” Lineberger said. “I’m glad the horticulture society felt the same way.”
The ASHS is an international association of horticulturists, founded in 1903. It commemorates horticultural sites of “historical, scientific, environmental and aesthetic value” by designating them as horticultural landmarks. The River Walk is the eighth site to earn this distinction.
“Horticultural sites designated as landmarks are of great public appreciation and interest,” said Michael Neff, the society’s executive director. “They are selected using a combination of factors, including their aesthetics, historical and teaching value, and accessibility to the public.”
The plaque designating the site a horticultural landmark is on permanent display at Peak’s Park, located off River Walk’s Commerce Street entrance near The Greater San Antonio Chamber of Commerce.
Some of the sites already designated horticultural landmarks are: Thomas Jefferson’s home and gardens at Monticello in Charlottesville, Va; the U.S. Botanic Garden in Washington, D.C.; and the Luther Burbank Home and Gardens in Santa Rosa, Calif.
“The San Antonio River Walk is a unique horticultural environment,” said Lynn Rawe, Texas Cooperative Extension agent for horticulture.
“There you can see a collection of plants and trees you won’t find in any other urban setting,” she said. “And lot of the flora has been there for centuries, so it has a strong historical significance too.”
The San Antonio River Walk was initially designed by landscape architect Robert Hugman. From its beginning as the “San Antonio River Beautification Project” in the late 1930s, the area was intended to blend the commercial and entertainment portions of downtown San Antonio with the area’s natural beauty. Over the years, the River Walk has grown into a 2.5-mile-long stretch within the heart of downtown San Antonio, but its original purpose has remained unchanged.
“One of the unique aspects of the River Walk is its accessibility,” Lineberger said. “People can easily travel through this environment and, in essence, become part of it. The interaction between people and nature is immediate and seamless.”
The flora around the San Antonio River Walk is unusually diverse, he added. “Trees like palm, lemon, banana, papaya and avocado grow well in this zone. They can be seen on the River Walk, planted among the more typical trees of the region, such as oak, pecan and bald cypress.”
Tourists are often surprised to see tropical plants growing along with vegetation that’s more common to South Texas, said Lineberger.
Jean Havens of Montgomery, Ala., a recent visitor to River Walk, said she enjoyed seeing tropical foliage mixed in with other regional plants. “It makes you feel like you just want to sit back, relax and drink a margarita,” she said. “And that’s just what I’m about to do!”
Harmon and Christine Daughrity of Burns, Tenn., also recent visitors, said they appreciated that the people of San Antonio had preserved so much vegetation in the downtown area.
“We like to look at the plants and trees in the places we visit,” said Harmon Daughrity. “One of the things we like the most as tourists is visiting a place that has a good natural environment.”
According to Lineberger, the River Walk provides a growing environment which supports hardy native trees and plants, as well as a number of different and less-hardy plants. “And because it’s below street level, it creates a microclimate that can be five to seven degrees cooler than normal in the summer and warmer in the winter. That makes it more pleasant for tourists.”
Now the site has been designated a horticultural landmark, the horticulture faculty at Texas A&M hopes more visitors will take time to smell the roses or honeysuckle and night-blooming jasmine along the River Walk.
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