Riverdale Park, which has already seen three new pieces of public art added near the Whole Foods last year, has installed a new sculpture along East-West Highway.

“Great Blue Herons” depicts three blue herons touching wingtips to form the international symbol for recycling. It’s a subtle environmental message at a time when trash still threatens wildlife on the Northeast Branch of the Anacostia River.

The sculpture could also be seen as something of a memorial for Cottage City sculptor Joanna Campbell Blake, who worked on it before her death at the age of 39.

Blake, who often worked out of a sculpture studio in Brentwood, is best known for her contributions to the National World War II Memorial and for designing and creating the Battle of Bladensburg Monument, installed in a park near the Peace Cross off Route 1.

The monument is an 8-by-10-foot bronze relief depicting the commodore in charge of the American forces at an early battle in the War of 1812, a wounded former enslaved person who played a role and an unnamed Marine. It took more than two years of work.

“Great Blue Herons” is a smaller work than that but not a lesser one. It stands at the corner of Baltimore Ave and East West Highway in Riverdale Park, where more than 40,000 cars pass daily.