Category — Community Gardens

A lot in the 400 block of North Kedzie Avenue is being transformed into an urban farm that will produce fresh produce for low-income residents. Photo by Victoria Johnson.

“So this is the way we’re going to get high-quality, local, responsibly-grown produce to low-income residents.”

By Victoria Johnson
DNAinfo Chicago
June 7, 2013

Excerpt:

HUMBOLDT PARK — In a deal put before the City Council this week, 11 city-owned lots on the southern end of Humboldt Park are on their way to becoming veggie-laden urban farms bearing fresh produce for needy residents.

The proposal would see the lots — in the 400 block of North Kedzie, Albany and Whipple Avenues — sold to NeighborSpace for $1 a piece to be converted into a 2.6 acres of urban farmland.

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Paul Hughes stands in the centre of the tilled portion of the plot. Photos by Josh Naud.

Grow Calgary breaks ground on urban farm. Volunteers get their hands dirty to grow fresh produce for the food bank

By Maureen McNamee
Fast Forward Weekly
May 30, 2013

Excerpt:

A Transportation Utility Corridor (TUC) west of Canada Olympic Park is now being put to good use as an urban farm and food justice project that will donate its harvest to the Calgary Food Bank.

Grow Calgary recently received permission to access the 11-acre field of agricultural land beside the TransCanada Highway just west of Canada Olympic Park, and has already tilled it in preparation for growing potatoes, lettuce, cabbage, carrots, tomatoes and much, much more.

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Garden at the Kalisher Absorption Center in Beer Sheva (Photo: JAFI). The Kalisher Absorption Center showcased the colorful fruits and vegetables of its Ethiopian immigrant gardeners.

Greeting visitors was an agricultural oasis of sprawling corn stalks and pumpkin vines

By Sharon Udasin
The Jerusalem
06/02/2013

Excerpt:

At the absorption center, each new immigrant family tends to their own garden plot and can grow fruits and vegetables for their own consumption at home, the Jewish Agency explained. In addition to growing Israeli crops, the families raise a variety of traditional Ethiopian vegetables like gomen (a type of lettuce), ma’ashila (a type of corn), doba (a type of pumpkin), barbery (a type of hot pepper), teff (a traditional grain used to make injera flatbread) and zekagbe (a type of basil).

The goal of the community garden setting is to provide the new immigrants with small-scale agriculture that can connect them to their pasts as well as facilitate their absorption into Israel, according to absorption center director Talia Artzi. The center is home to about 320 immigrants.

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“Not Just a Passing Fancy”

By Judy Maan Miedema, Ellen Desjardins, Kevan Marshall
Region of Waterloo Public Health
May 2013

The Region of Waterloo Public Health recently completed a Community Gardening Storytelling Project in which we used unstructured, ethnographic interviews to learn more about the meaning of community gardening in people’s lives. Then – in keeping with a storytelling approach – we produced three short videos to illustrate the three main themes from our research – inclusion, health, and learning.

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Victor Guerin from Musqueam sang blessing song at new community garden in Tsleilwaututh – means a place to grow food. By Gabriel Edge George.

People of the Inlet – We have inhabited the lands and waters of our traditional territory since time immemorial.

Located in North Vancouver, the Tsleil-Waututh Nation’s garden program is focused on providing access to hands-on gardening and food programming for the community. The garden will provide a space for community members to grow traditional food and medicines, and learn about healthy food choices.

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The plot will, in fact, be used to create 55 units of affordable housing

By Lauren Evans
Gothamist
May 23, 2013

Excerpt:

Last month, a group of volunteers with the environmental advocacy group Time’s Up decided to clean up the long-abandoned lot at 99 South 5th Street in Williamsburg. The space had been vacant for more than 20 years, and the group thought the neighborhood would benefit from a thorough cleaning and the addition of plants, flowers, trees and benches.

Unfortunately, the city had different plans. An RFP for a developer had been issued in May of last year, with the intention of turning the plot into a mixed-use development. This morning the fledgeling garden was bulldozed without warning.

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In the Sikh community garden in Fresno, where older gardeners mentor younger ones. Credit: Jim Wilson/The New York Times.

Older Sikhs are mentors to younger gardeners, instructing them on how to harvest fenugreek seeds and use a hand sickle called a datri.

By Patricia Leigh Brown
The New York Times
Published: May 25, 2013

Excerpt:

FRESNO, Calif. — Like Scotch broom and dandelions, despair can be invasive. This is why, every Monday, Lee Lee, a Hmong refugee, puts on her sun hat and flip-flops, grabs the hoe handmade by her father and brother in Laos and heads to the Hmong Village Community Garden here, where she tends rows of purple lemon grass, bitter melon and medicinal herbs along with other Hmong women.

“It lightens the load,” said Ms. Lee, whose depression has led her to think about suicide. “It brings peace, so I do not forget who I am.”

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The attorney for the developer. Photo by Barbara Ross.

“It’s devastating to see this because I pour out my heart and soul into this garden.”

By Marc Yearsley
Gothamist
May 15, 2013

Excerpt:

A portion of a community garden that has served children on the Lower East Side since 1982 was destroyed this morning when a developer unexpectedly ordered workers to construct a fence on the portion of the property he owns. After a construction crew hired by developer Serge Hoyda arrived at the Children’s Magical Garden on the corner of Stanton and Norfolk, community members attempted to stop the crew’s entry into the garden, prompting the developer to call the NYPD.

High school senior Amina Begum currently works at the garden, which she has used since she was in the 6th grade. “It’s devastating to see this because I pour out my heart and soul into this garden,” she said. “So many kids come over here and make friends and grow up. It’s a memory for them.”

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August 8-11 2013, Seattle, Washington

Four days of workshops and tours showcase exciting developments in the world of community gardening and urban agriculture.
Early Bird Registration: open now to June 15, 2013. Scholarship are also available and due date for scholarship application is June 1, 2013.

Urban Agriculture Tours:

Seattle has a vibrant urban agriculture community that includes continued cultivation of land that once embodied the livelihood of local farmers. Join us to take a look at the old lands still under cultivation in new ways, some of the innovative market gardens that have sprung up across the city and their venues for selling their produce and a peek at a learning garden that specializes in empowering people to grow their own!

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Pete sings “Turn, Turn, Turn”

Video shot by John Rokosny and Andriette Redmon.
Produced by WingFlix.Com
Published on May 2, 2013

Happy 94th Birthday to Pete Seeger at the New York City Community Garden Coalition’s “Stand for the Land” Forum, April 27, 2013 at the Great Hall at Cooper Union. Pete is presented the Hammer of Justice by Haja Worley.

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Campaigners ‘absolutely gutted’ over allotment decision.

UK gardens will be replaced by hospital and homes

By Adam Binnie
Waterford Observer
May 8, 2013

Excerpt:

An allotment campaign group has vowed to continue fighting to save a patch of West Watford allotments, after the Government has granted permission to build on it as part of the Watford Health Campus.

The Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, Eric Pickles, announced today that he has approved building on the Farm Terrace allotments as part of project, which includes a new hospital and 600 homes.

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Garden of 3 Points on Chesnut Avenue, a community garden in the East Ward started by Isles Inc. Photo by Andrew Miller.

“My grandpa didn’t let my grandma in the garden,” he said. “That’s just the way it was.”

By Erin Duffy
The Times of Trenton
May 04, 2013

Excerpt:

TRENTON — As a young man, Clarence Henley swore he’d never work a patch of dirt again.

Henley, now 78, grew up on a farm in Georgia. He knows firsthand the back-breaking labor that goes into spring plantings and fall harvests.

“We raised cotton, corn, sweet peppers,” he said. “It’s hard work. We worked sun up to sun down.”

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Bristol permaculture guru Mike Feingold has four plots which he uses to demonstrate, trial and teach permaculture principles. Photo by Mark Diacono.

What began as book research – to find beautiful and interesting allotments – became a pilgrimage to Britain’s top plots

By Lia Leendertz
The Guardian
12 April 2013
Last year Lia Leendertz and Mark Diacono tracked down 30 of the most beautiful and interesting allotments in the country for their new book My Cool Allotment.

Excerpt:

The allotmenters on whom photographer Mark Diacono and I eventually settled ran the complete gamut, from the old boys doing things the traditional way – all sharply edged and weed-free beds – to the permaculturists seeking out a new and more sustainable path, with not an inch of bare ground to show for themselves. Each would be horrified by the other’s plots, but each starts from the same basic point: the same-sized plot of rented land and a desire to grow. Artists, jam-makers, a prize dahlia grower and a grower of dye plants had all turned their plots to their own particular needs. We found orchards, vineyards, cut flower gardens and national plant collections, all as different as can be, all homed in plots of roughly 10 poles (to use the medieval word that lingers on purely for the measuring of allotments) or about 250 square metres.

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Click on image to enlarge.

64 community garden beds (2 wheelchair accessible beds & 4 kid-friendly height beds)

By Chris Reid
Shifting Growth
April 28, 2013

Shifting Growth and The Foothills at Burke Mountain proudly unveiled the new Burke Mountain Community Garden this Sunday April 28, 2013. The garden is a growing space for the community with a goal to build healthy, resilient, and welcoming communities in and around the garden.

The garden was created as a temporary garden. The long-term future last use will be evaluated at a later date, allowing an opportunity to create a temporary community garden for residents of Burke Mountain. All infrastructure and garden beds were filled off site and simply placed pre-assembled on-site.

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Community gardens, like this one on DeLair Road in Abbotsford, are thriving and there’s a waiting list for garden plots. Photograph by: John Van Putten.

Reimer Middle School plants a garden for the nearby community

By Christina Toth
The Abottsford Times
April 25, 2013

Excerpt:

Five years ago, there were maybe 10 from Langley to Agassiz, and now there are 28 and counting, but that’s not a surprise to community garden crusader Kayla Feenstra.

People crave to feel the soil, to be in the fresh air, and to fuss over tender green things. While growing one’s own grub is important, there is also a social component for those who yearn for green thumb fellowship, especially for those who are retired and have downsized into an apartment, said Feenstra.

“They don’t have land anymore but are itching to get their hands into the dirt,” she said.

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Halsey St. Ralph & Howard Community Garden. By Hayward Prudhomme.

Parks Department’s GreenThumb Now Accepting Applications for New Gardens for Healthy Communities

Excerpt:

The Mayor’s Obesity Task Force was convened in January 2012 to combat the obesity epidemic, which is a leading cause of preventable deaths in NYC second only to tobacco. In May of 2012, the Mayor’s Obesity Task Force report was issued, identifying 26 initiatives to address obesity. Initiative #15 is to create new community garden sites via the Parks Department’s GreenThumb program. Community gardening is a way to improve access to healthy and fresh food, enhance residents’ health and quality of life and connect people to where their food comes from.

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Click on image to link to larger image.

Sustainable Simon Fraser University (SFU) Learning Garden

By Chris Reid
Shifting Growth
April 2013

Shifting Growth was awarded the Request for Proposal to undertake the community consultation, design, and garden installation of the ‘Sustainable SFU Learning Garden’ – a temporary garden on a vacant, under-utilized piece of land in the heart of SFU’s Burnaby Campus. The Sustainable SFU Learning Garden is a new garden facility near SFU Burnaby’s Convocation Mall. This new garden is a student-centered education and social space. Members will learn how to grow, eat, and share campus-grown food while making SFU Burnaby a more sustainable community.

All garden features are atop of shipping pallets, allowing the Sustainable SFU a 3-year agreement for the land to utilize as a temporary growing space. Constructed with BC cedar and black hinges, the garden beds sit at varies height.

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The garden will have special areas for children and adult gardeners.

Fifty “citizenvestors” donated a total of $2,163 dollars to fund the garden

By Alex Wigglesworth
Metro
April 22, 2013

Excerpt:

The Rivera Community Garden at the Rivera Recreation Center in North Philadelphia will be transformed into a 40-by-60-foot fenced in garden with smaller raised beds for children and larger beds for adults.

Fifty “citizenvestors” donated a total of $2,163 dollars to fund the garden through the site.

The money will go toward the city Department of Parks and Recreation, which will use it to purchase and plant greens.

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A new study looks at the difference between gardeners and their neighbors. The gardener’s likelihood of being obese is far lower than the foodie, non-gardener’s.

A new study recommends that city planners and public health officials take a new tack when it comes to keeping their communities healthy: gardening.

By Ansa Varughese
Medical Daily
Apr 23, 2013

Excerpt:

Working in a community garden could mean the difference between obesity and healthy weight, a new study suggests.

Researchers culled measurements of body fat and weight from community gardeners and non-gardeners and found that the gardeners weighed less than their non-farming neighbors. It wasn’t just luck of the draw, either; gardeners were shown to have a lower body-mass index than their non-gardening siblings.

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Brad Johnson, owner of Lawn America (left), and Chris Segraves rake the topsoil of a new community garden they helped install Monday at Fairmont Terrace. Photo by John Clanton.

Tulsa, Oklahoma: The spotlight turned to the area after four women were found shot to death inside an apartment in early January.

By Jerry Wofford
Tulsa World
Apr 22, 2013

Excerpt:

What was a grassy area surrounding the Fairmont Terrace pool will soon be full of fruits, vegetables and other plants at the complex’s community garden.

The 3,200-square-foot garden was built Monday with donated material and labor. Organizers hope it will enhance the sense of community at the apartment complex, be an educational tool for kids and provide residents with fresh, healthy food.

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