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UPDATE: This post was updated at 12:16 p.m. on Oct. 24, 2024.

Look out the window next time you drive down Meadowbrook Drive and you’ll likely notice a large birdhouse in the shape of a Syracuse University basketball. Further along, you’ll see more replica birdhouses – a tall white church, complete with a steeple and stained glass and even a minion from “Despicable Me.”

The collection of birdhouses along the street’s median, set against vibrant floral gardens, attract drivers, runners, walkers and tourists. The gardens and bird houses stretch from Nottingham High School to beyond Euclid Avenue.

“People like it because it’s so whimsical to drive down Meadowbrook and see all the little birdhouses,” Dudley Breed, a neighborhood resident who’s been involved with creating the birdhouses, said.

Breed, along with neighbors Tim Robinson, Dave Kirby and Dan Stricker, have transformed their neighborhood through the greenery and birdhouses. What started off as a few plantings has now expanded to 29 gardens and around 25 birdhouses along the street, Kirby said. For many residents, the installations give their neighborhood a strong sense of community and ownership.

Solange Jain | Asst. Photo Editor

A replica of a Syracuse University basketball is another structure displayed on Meadowbrook Drive in the University Neighborhood. The multi-faceted project brought residents together.

Over 15 years ago, Stricker wanted to add to the greenery and gardens that had already been planted in his neighborhood. He noticed many birds nearby, which inspired him to build and put up the first birdhouse.

Stricker and Robinson worked together to construct the birdhouses after the first few went up. From there, the project exploded and more birdhouses appeared in the neighborhood, Stricker said.

Now, the birdhouses have become an invaluable addition to the neighborhood. People change their driving routes on the way to work and even come from out of town just to take a peep at the birdhouses and flowers.

Gary Steele, another resident and birdhouse builder, said the ideation process for the birdhouses relies on constant improvisation when the construction doesn’t go as planned. For Steele and Stricker, the process starts with a vision in their head of how they want a new birdhouse to look, rather than a sketch or concrete plan.

Steele began creating some of his own birdhouses over a decade ago, starting with one on Montana Street. As some of the installations are up to 15 years old, Steele takes them down and repairs or repaints them if they’re damaged.

Neighborhood residents take on different roles, each adding something to the production of the birdhouses. Robinson built the basketball, church, plane and minion. He and Stricker uphold the creative end of the birdhouse installations, while Kirby has been managing the gardening and business side since its inception.

Solange Jain | Asst. Photo Editor

A large minion sculpture sits outside homes on Meadowbrook Drive in Syracuse. The creative aspects sprinkled throughout the University Neighborhood spark conversations among residents.

Each year, the neighborhood’s gardens, which are county property, receive about 3,000 plantings, including flowers like zinnias and marigolds from the Onondaga Park Greenhouse.

The collective effort is maintained by Meadowbrook neighbors who do their own gardening along the street median, where flowers are planted, Kirby said. Breed, a retired landscaper, said that it’s all one large, interconnected park system.

Stricker reached out to Breed over a decade ago because of his experience landscaping at Nottingham High School. Breed sketched plans for a park that is now located where Meadowbrook meets Euclid.

Though the park doesn’t have an official name, Kirby calls it “Euclid Park.” It features birdhouses, pathways, flowers and several benches – one of which has poetry etched into the back, a detail done by a friend of Breed’s daughter.

The gardens and birdhouses are a point of conversation and a shared bond between residents that make Meadowbrook a distinct community, Kirby said. As neighbors and volunteers work in their gardens, passing cars stop to acknowledge their work.

“There’s a value to it that everybody understands and wants to be a part of,” Breed said.

The ongoing environmental project has brought SU students off campus to aid with maintaining the gardens. John Parrish, an SU graduate who now lives in Louisiana, spent two summers planting flower beds and spreading mulch along the median after connecting with Kirby.

“Those neighborhoods that aren’t part of Syracuse University whatsoever have their identities forever linked with the school through their support and cooperation,” Parrish said.

Stricker said people have gone as far as moving to the area to live alongside the multi-faceted project. He said the beautification project gives the neighborhood a certain flavor.

“I see houses for sale on Zillow and there’s one of my birdhouses in the background,” he said.

Stricker used to see many out-of-town teachers frequent the area. He said one former colleague from Edward Smith School, an elementary school nearby, told him she takes a drive down Meadowbrook whenever she feels low.

The birdhouses and gardens of Meadowbrook work in tandem to lift peoples’ moods and create community, Stricker said. It’s hard to talk about one without talking about the other because of how well they compliment each other.

“If we didn’t have the volunteers we wouldn’t be doing this, and if we didn’t have the generosity of the neighborhood we couldn’t be doing this,” Kirby said. “It’s a collective effort that keeps it going.”

Published on October 24, 2024 at 1:06 am