The “Wireless Wilderness” Cell Phone Tour at West 11th Street Park was awarded a Mayor’s Proud Partner Award at the annual awards luncheon sponsored by Keep Houston Beautiful.

These annual awards go to individuals or groups that have played an important role in bettering the environment, building community pride, and enhancing the quality of life for Houstonians.

The tour was created and funded by Friends of West 11th Street Park with the objective of making the park an innovative educational resource while preserving the natural ambience of this beautiful 21-acre inner-city forest.

The content of the recorded messages on the tour was reviewed by educators, scientists, and Certified Master Naturalists. The goal was to provide information that is interesting, fun, and educational.

The 13 sites include commentary on topics such as bird migration, tree rings, and poison ivy, and also provided explanations and examples of more advanced topics, such as allelopathy, flood water retention and invasive species.

“The self-guided nature tour that we developed in cooperation with local educators and master naturalists has been operational since April 2010,” said Lorraine Cherry, president of Friends of West 11th Street Park.

“To date, we have had over 1,200 calls totaling 72 hours of time voluntarily spent learning about nature,” she added.

The long-term plan for this project is to continue the educational outreach to Houston area neighborhoods, schools  and scouting groups, encouraging people to visit the park and learn about nature in a peaceful, beautiful and safe environment.

For information about the “Wireless Wilderness” cell phone tour, visit the Friends Web site at: www.wireless wilderness.org.

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