In Richmond, Virginia, Mark Lilly is taking local food to the people

By Lorie Johnson
CBN News Medical Reporter
August 18, 2010

Excerpt:

After Lilly collects the food from his various local farmers, he turns around and travels back to the city: the inner city. His roving farmers market makes stops in so-called “food deserts,” urban areas where thousands of people who don’t have transportation live more than a mile from a grocery store.

In such areas, people have little choice but to settle for whatever unhealthy processed food is available at the corner convenience store, next to the cigarettes and lottery tickets.

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One man’s parking garage is the same man’s garden — where he’s proving it’s possible to grow a significant portion of his own food at home, even in a San Francisco apartment building!

By Jon Brooks
Tonic.com
August 4, 2010

Excerpt:

It started three years ago with a single tomato plant. Today, he and his wife Ellen estimate that they grow 25-30 percent of their total food intake. Current crops include tomatoes, peas, blackberries, raspberries, basil, carrots, mushrooms and several types of lettuce, almost all cultivated in nine half-barrels of soil, tucked away in a corner of their San Francisco apartment’s parking garage. He is also growing sprouts in a couple of jars on his kitchen table.

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Atlantic City Nursery Concept Plan

City Farming Gaining Ground

Our American Generation
Aug 17, 2010

Excerpt:

In late 2009, the 72-year old Atlantic City Nursery in Rainier Beach was closed by Seattle Parks and Recreation, which cited fiscal reasons. This opened up a public process to determine the site’s future use, and the Friends of the Atlantic City Nursery decided to try to turn the site into an urban farm while also restoring part of the original wetlands. Most of the participants in this process are residents of Rainier Beach; that, coupled with Rainier Beach’s lower-income demographic, should help calm fears of outsider, elitist interests.

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The Ala Wai Community Garden, above, in Honolulu.

These 10 U.S. cities have the most community gardens per capita, according to the Trust for Public Land.

By Jessica C. Wakeman
The Daily Green
August 16, 2010

Excerpts:

Seattle

Seattle’s P-Patch Program provides 68 gardens for residents throughout the city, with plans for four additional gardens by the end of 2009. The program was created by the Department of Neighborhoods and the nonprofit P-Patch Trust in 1973. Their volunteer-run community gardens offer 1,900 plots and serves more than 3,800 urban gardeners on 23 acres of land. With a youth gardening program and a 12.3-ton produce donation last year, Seattle is a city built for horticulturists.

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The Local Show on KCPT is designed to highlight artists and entrepreneurs, leaders and overachievers from all walks of life – and in the process, help Kansas Citizens discover substantially more about this place we call home.

Link to Kansas City Center for Urban Agriculture here.