The Production Potential of Detroit’s Vacant Land

Urban Agriculture, Pierce Street.

4,000 acres of available land in Detroit could supply up to 75 percent of fresh vegetables and 40 percent of fruit available to residents

By Kathryn Colasanti, Charlotte Litjens & Michael Hamm
The C.S. Mott Group for Sustainable Food Systems at MSU
June 2010

Reported by Andrew Krietz
State News
Nov. 18, 2010

Excerpt:

In a study published in the current edition of The Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development, MSU academic specialist Kathryn Colasanti found the more than 4,000 acres of available land in Detroit could supply up to 75 percent of fresh vegetables and 40 percent of fruit available to residents.

Those numbers became apparent after a bulk of her master’s thesis project was complete in May 2009, she said.

Colasanti led the study for the C.S. Mott Group for Sustainable Food Systems at MSU.

“(The project) was really meant to contribute to the conversation,” she said.

“There’s been so much talk about the urban farm — (the) urban gardening movement is exploding.”

When a combination of community gardens, hoop houses — which act as greenhouses — storage houses and urban farms are used, those percentages of produce could be obtained, Colasanti said.

During the past three years, she took part in interviews with community members and engaged in numerous focus groups citywide; agricultural activities could be another solution to the city’s vacancy, she said.

“(It’s about) how to use that vacant land,” Colasanti said. “This would be that piece of the puzzle to figure out what that (approach) is.”

Although the research did not assess economic feasibility, a typical 30-by-96 foot hoop house costs about $15,000 each, Colasanti said.

News story here, “Farming could fill Detroit’s vacant land”.

Growing Food in the City: The Production Potential of Detroit’s Vacant Land research paper here.

Thesis – Growing food in the city: Two approaches to exploring scaling up urban agriculture in Detroit by Colasanti, Kathryn J. A., M.S., Michigan State University, 2009, 139 pages.

Link to The Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development here.