Artist Sharon Kallis does some plant weaving at Vancouver’s Means of Production garden. Photo by David Gowman.

The organizations and individuals behind them are making a new genre of public art that focuses on community, utility, sustainability, and reclaiming marginal urban areas for cultivation.

By Robin Laurence
Georgia Straight
August 22, 2011

Excerpt:

In collaboration with other groups and individuals, Grow cultivates a wide array of vegetables, herbs, and edible flowers in reclaimed and repurposed containers, all sitting on recycled wooden shipping pallets. At the same time, it sponsors walks and workshops, and—against a backdrop of high-end condos and the nonconsultative hideosity that is B.C. Place—promotes dialogue around issues of “sustainability, food security, and collective initiatives in urban areas,” Schmidt says.

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After taking a gardening class, Ron Finley planted vegetables, flowers and fruit in front of his Crenshaw-area home. It offers a free meal and a gathering place for the hard-pressed neighborhood. Photo by Mark Boster, Los Angeles Times.

Ron Finley planted a garden that fed both stomachs and souls in an area where healthful food is scarce. When the city demanded he remove it, neighbors protested and a councilman stepped in to mediate.

By Steve Lopez
LA Times
August 20, 2011

Excerpt:

Consider this the latest installment in the “no good deed goes unpunished” chronicles.

Our story began last spring, when fashion designer Ron Finley admitted to himself that, while he’s always enjoyed gardening, he didn’t really know what the hay he was doing.

“I’d just stick something in the ground and see what happened.”

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Urban agriculture functions as a catalyst for larger food system transformations.

By the Urban Design Lab
The Earth Institute and Columb1a University
Prepared by Kubi Ackerman
Project Team:
Richard Plunz, Urban Design Lab, Columbia University
Michael Conard, Urban Design Lab, Columbia University
Ruth Katz, Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture
Sarah Brennan, Lenfest Center for Sustainable Energy, Columbia University Patricia Culligan, School of Engineering and Applied Science, Columbia University
2011, 112 pages

Excerpt:

Key findings in brief

• Urban agriculture can play a critical role as productive green urban infrastructure. There is significant potential for urban agriculture to provide critical environmental services to the city through stormwater runoff mitigation, soil remediation, and energy use reduction. At a time when municipalities are straining to address complex infrastructural challenges with limited budgets, productive urban green spaces will be increasingly important in their capacity to function as a cost-effective form of small scale, distributed green infrastructure.

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