Earth Day has come and gone. And with its few hours of mirth came questions of its worth.
To mark the occasion, borough revelers planned to plant a tree, a deliberately ugly shrub that nobody would steal. Meanwhile, like tumbleweed, trash blew down the streets.
Earth Day started in 1970 with big themes, and it has kept them: from whaling to nuclear disarmament to population control. Along the way it's been stylized by Ben and Jerry's ice cream and savaged by deadpan critics who estimated how many tons of garbage green partiers left behind in Central Park.
But if Earth Days were meant to save the world, they probably were never quite ready for the Bronx.
There have been successes, of course. The United States has enacted landmark pieces of environmental legislation, such as the Endangered Species Act and the recent Safe Drinking Water Act. Some species, such as the bald eagle, have returned to sections of the lower 48 states. But Earth Days have also been celebrated amidst the grounding of the Exxon Valdez and the discovery of barren Adirondack lakes, acidified by rain.
Yet there is always hope.
Timmy Moynihan, a firefighter and fishing addict, has watched the borough's rivers become cleaner during his eight years of jogging along their shorelines.
"There's striped bass and bluefish feeding there now," he said. "They even got a charter boat that goes out and fishes for them under the Triborough Bridge. I saw it on ESPN."
Moynihan says that when tides slacken along Randall's Island he sees schools of baitfish suspended in the now-clear waters. But if the waters tend toward the pellucid, they remain polluted, too: clear water frequently reveals rusted hulks of cars.
And the state recommends that fisherman limit fish consumption because the fish carry cancer-causing toxins, including PCBs. Or successful anglers can follow the advice of Great Lakes skippers, who know how to put their money where their industry is: PCBs aren't a problem; you can't even taste `em if you slosh on enough mayonnaise.
Another improvement is the current construction of a water filtration plant, which will screen microbes from tap water. But if cleaner water from the new plant is good news, the bad news is that extensive suburban development fouled the water in the first place.
And Earth Day passed largely unnoticed by the environmental saboteurs who frequent the borough.
Waterfront properties have long been the target of clandestine dumpers who discard mounds of construction rubble, auto parts and tires. Here chop-shops abandon their stripped car frames, relegating them to borough scenery.
But it's not just vacant lots that harbor trash. Even as the swath of parkland along the Westchester boundary beckons die-hard golfers and strollers, it also serves as a resting place for acres of trash, said Michael J. Browne Jr., a borough parks supervisor who recently toured a waterfront section of Pelham Bay Park. There he encountered layers of floating junk he called "a ring around the collar."
"It was a shocking experience," he said. "I was going to check out some cool wetland areas, and all the greenery is just camouflaging garbage."
Browne has an Earth Day suggestion, this 25th year of the ceremony. But it's not about pretending to save rain forests or humpback whales. It's not about nuclear disarmament or population control.
It's a bit more local.
"I would yell at the people for throwing their garbage around," he said. "It's like they never heard of garbage cans, or they can't hold on to their garbage until they see one. It's disgusting."