Category — Community Gardens

Rt. Hon. John F. Spellar MP.

Stated quite clearly that they do not “intend to remove Local Authorities statutory duties to provide allotments.”

26th May 2011 News Release

Warley MP John Spellar who has been campaigning against proposed changes to allotments legislation has welcomed a climb-down by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

The Government had issued a Consultation Paper on Legal Duties on Local Councils which could be removed. Among those were obligations under the 1908 Allotment Act to provide allotments. John Spellar and other MPs had warned that this could lead Councils, especially those facing financial pressure, to reduce their commitment to allotments.

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Archive photo from 45 years ago. Date: 1966. Description: Youth working on Roxbury/Dorchester Community Beautification Program project site. Label reads: “The lot was cleared of two abandoned automobiles and several truck loads of trash. Railroad ties and top soil were put in place to form small flower gardens.” Group: Freedom House (Roxbury, Boston, Mass.). Northeastern University Library.

Community members will also be able to meet with prospective farms to discuss their proposals before starting to farm

By Gintautas Dumcius
Dorchester Reporter
May. 26, 2011

Excerpt:

City Councillor Charles Yancey and several disgruntled residents faced off against Menino administration officials this week, claiming they were not informed about the city’s attempt to temporarily turn four city-owned vacant lots in Dorchester into urban farms.

Proponents say the farms would put the vacant lots to use, improving community access to affordable and healthy food by allowing cultivation of crops and composting of materials on properties that range from a quarter acre to a half-acre. The properties, owned by the Department of Neighborhood Development, include 131 Glenway St., 18-24 Standish St., 23-29 Tucker St. and the parcel between 94 Ballou Ave. and 116 Ballou Ave.

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The city has forbidden Jacob de Raadt from gardening in a plot beside Nicomekl Elementary. Photograph by: Les Bazso, The Province.

Red tape trips up green thumb in Langley, BC

By Cheryl Chan
The Province
May 25, 2011

Excerpt:

All Jacob de Raadt wants to do is plant some vegetables.

Instead, the 68-year-old Langley gardener’s visions of a bountiful harvest are getting nipped in the bud by what he calls “absurd” bureaucratic requirements.

When de Raadt and his wife Lydia paid $15 for a community garden plot beside Nicomekl Elementary near their townhouse in March they were told they had to undergo a criminal record check for the last five years.

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Released for the Five Year Anniversary of the Eviction Of the South Central Farmers in Los Angeles

Featuring Daryl Hannah, Julia Butterfly Hill, Alicia Silverstone, John Quigley and More

Press Release:

LOS ANGELES (May 19, 2011) – June 13, 2011 marks the five-year “anniversary” of the eviction of the farmers from the South Central Farm in downtown Los Angeles. The award-winning documentary short film SAVE THE FARM, directed by Michael Kuehnert, will be released on digital platforms on June 7, 2011 to commemorate the needless destruction of an important environmental and cultural oasis.

The South Central Farm (SCF) sprung up on an abandoned industrial area of approximately 14 acres in South Central Los Angeles. The land had been acquired by the City of Los Angeles in 1986 from developer Ralph Horowitz for $4.7 million.

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This is the Lots O’ Greens neighborhood garden in Detroit, The city, which revolutionized manufacturing with its auto assembly lines, could once again be a model for the world as residents transform vacant, often-blighted land into a source of fresh food. Photo by Carlos Osorio/AP.

“The gardens are everywhere, and you almost can’t drive anywhere without seeing one.”

By Mark Bittman
New York Times
May 17, 2011

Excerpt:

Imagine blocks that once boasted 30 houses, now with three; imagine hundreds of such blocks. Imagine the green space created by the city’s heartbreaking but intelligent policy of removing burnt-out or fallen-down houses. Now look at the corner of one such street, where a young man who has used the city’s “adopt-a-lot” program (it costs nothing) to establish an orchard, a garden and a would-be community center on three lots, one with a standing house. (The land, like many of the gardens, belongs to the city and is “leased” for a year at a time.

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Downtown Minneapolis. Photo by Tim Kiser.

13 “non-buildable” City-owned vacant lots available for community gardeners

Minneapolis City of Lakes
January 13, 2011

With seed catalogues arriving in the mail and flower and garden shows around the corner, now is a good time to look into establishing a community garden. The City of Minneapolis has 13 vacant lots available for qualifying groups to lease for community gardens. These City-owned lots were selected because they are not appropriate for development. This means that they will remain available for years of gardening even as the economy changes and redevelopment picks up.

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See photos of the garden here.

Cardiff photographer Tom Ashmore visits the Riverside community allotment garden

Excerpt:

I was met by a lovely lady of the earth called Jenny Howell, who let me through the gate with a warm-hearted welcome. She gave me a tour of the site and we had a chat about what they’re up to. I was instantly drawn to Jenny. You know the type of people – she had a chirpy voice and was full of life and humour. Being a total garden novice I relied on her expert knowledge to give me an understanding of what they do, why it’s different, and how people benefit from volunteering.

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Tilling in preparation for fall crop planting, with the clubhouse in the background and one gardener dressed on his way to a funeral.

Community gardens are popping up quickly in a city once known as the most dangerous city in America.

By Robin Sheeves
Mother Nature Network
April 15, 2011

Excerpt:

Clean up and foundation work for the 100th community garden in the city of Camden, N.J., began yesterday. If you’re not familiar with the city of Camden, let me tell you, this is a big deal. I live about seven miles from Camden, but I might as well live a world away because my community is so different from Camden.

For years, Camden was known as the most dangerous city in America. It no longer holds that title, but it can proudly claim a different title, Fastest Growing Community Garden City.

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Good Ground Garden.

Thesis – Sacredness in the landscape

By Shawn C. James
Thesis 2011
Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Landscape Architecture in Landscape Architecture in the Graduate College of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2011

Abstract:

Faith-based organizations throughout the United States are creating gardens with a variety of visions and results. Ten such gardens were present in Champaign and Urbana, IL in 2010. This phenomenon of faith-based gardening is designated as stewardship gardening within this thesis. While these gardens are recently conspicuous, they are certainly not new; disparate connotations of environmental stewardship have developed since the Garden of Eden. The contemporary call for environmental stewardship should acknowledge its historical implications with consideration of the boundaries between ecocentric and anthropocentric world views.

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Winter cover crops contribute to healthy gardens.

A Horticulture Project at Cornell University

Our goals are:

To document the roles of community gardens in providing healthy food, green space, and environmental education, in order to build support for community gardening in urban policy and planning.

To develop environmentally friendly vegetable gardening practices like cover cropping, with and for urban gardeners.

To enhance educational programs in urban gardening by incorporating collaborative, discovery-based learning methods that increases gardeners’ understanding of ecology.

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Video: Jon Woodward on urban gardening.

Forget lofts in Gastown. The hottest real estate in Vancouver is somewhere you might not have expected: your local community garden.

By: Darcy Wintonyk,
CTV BC
Apr. 5, 2011

Excerpt:

Neighbourhood plots are springing up around the city, but not fast enough to keep up with the demand from urbanites hoping to get a healthy injection of the city farming experience.

Wait lists continue to grow as the desire to be a part of plant parenthood blossoms, says Michael Levenston, executive director of Vancouver’s City Farmer, a non-profit agency dedicated to urban agriculture.

“The more multi-family homes in the city, the more people want to get out and get their hands in the ground. It’s getting back to nature and it’s hot in terms of demand,” Levenston told ctvbc.ca from his Kitsilano community garden headquarters.

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Mang Khan Zam, left, and Whitney Sewell transplant seedlings to their beds on the land they are farming on Folsom Avenue in St. Louis. The farm is part of the International Institute’s Global Farms Initiative that is designed to teach immigrants and refugees organic farming skills that they can develop into careers as farmers. Photo by David Carson.

“We’re trying to get them to eat familiar foods that they can grow instead of going to fast food places.”

By Doug Moore
SLT Today
April 15, 2011

Excerpt:

The urban agriculture program, run by the International Institute of St. Louis, is one of 19 across the country that have been funded by grants from the federal Office of Refugee Resettlement, a division of the Department of Health and Human Services. The grants this year total $1 million nationwide, with typical local awards of about $75,000.

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Photo by Stephanie Parker.

GRO1000 Grassroots Grants in the amount of up to $1,500

The next round of applications will be accepted starting in the fall 2011

Overview

The Scotts Miracle-Gro Company has established GRO1000, a commitment to install 1,000 gardens and green spaces in the United States and select international sites by 2018. The last installation will be completed in 2018, which coincides with the 150th anniversary of the founding of ScottsMiracle-Gro.

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Triscuit Declares Home Farming Day

Excerpt from press release April 12, 2011:

Triscuit and non-profit Urban Farming will unveil plans for 65 community-based home farms in 20 U.S. cities in 2011, including five home farms to be grown at low-income housing subsidiaries. These farms, located in urban areas, will provide local residents with greater access to more nutritious and healthier foods, consistent with the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) mission of creating more sustainable and diverse communities.

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The Ladner Community Garden Society plans to start a community garden at Kensington Park North this spring. Pictured are (left to right) Ian Dick, Don Bruchet, Kristin Couch and Mark MacDonald. Photograph by Chung Chow, Delta Optimist.

Project, with over 40 plots available to rent on seasonal basis, will be set up at Ladner’s Kensington Park North

By Sandor Gyarmati
The Delta Optimist
April 6, 2011

Excerpt:

“As we go forward and start seeing a lot more high density, a lot of people won’t have a back yard, so there’s going to be more need for community gardens for people who want to grow their own food,” Crouch said.

Crouch believes once the word spreads that a community garden is available, the 40-square-foot plots will be taken quickly.

She pointed to the lengthy wait lists in the City of Richmond that has eight city-owned community garden sites.

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Richmond Virginia community gardens.

City property to be developed into community gardens

March 29, 2011

Mayor Dwight C. Jones’ proposed ordinance of offering City property to non-profit organizations, civic associations, community groups, and other eligible entities to be developed into community gardens was unanimously approved by Richmond City Council last night. The new ordinance requires the creation of a permit process to enable certain parcels of City-owned real estate to be used for community gardens.

“This program allows the City to offer its residents something with immeasurable value – the opportunity to grow healthy food in their own neighborhoods,” said Mayor Jones. “This in turn creates a cycle of healthy behavior throughout the community. Neighbors will not only become healthier through the foods they eat, they will also get to know each other, strengthening community ties. Children will get to see where food comes from and be more excited about eating a healthy diet. Residents will take back vacant lots from possible criminal behavior and businesses will want to locate to these vibrant, safe, healthy neighborhoods.”

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Mr & Mrs Vinegar. Illustration by Arthur Rackham. From the book ‘English Fairy Tales’, first published 1918.

I have often heard the pleasant sound of the spade even by moonlight.

By George Johnson
The Cottage Gardener
Volume 4, London
1850

Excerpt:

There is some spare time for labourers, in the long days when work is over, that might be profitably spent in cultivating vegetables; and this makes it sad to see idle men and boys lounging in a village street, having nothing to occupy their evening hours. The allotments, indeed, where they exist at all, employ many who frequently toil on them till it is quite dark; and I have often heard the pleasant sound of the spade even by moonlight. But still, in a populous village there are a great number who really have no ground to till, except, perhaps, an atom of damp earth behind their dwellings. It would be a work of ‘rational’, doubly-beneficial charity – a means of doing unspeakable good – to let, or rent for the purpose of letting, to the poor pieces of land near every village; so that as many as possible, if not all the cottagers, should have a portion of ground to cultivate. Industrious characters would thus be materially assisted in providing for their families, and men of lazy habits ‘might’ be encouraged to amend.

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The great thing about our model is that you can get a great amount of food with doing a small amount of work.

By Buffalo Rising
Apr 4, 2011

Excerpt:

BRO interview with Jessica Lang of Cold Spring Cooperative Farm:

BRO: When was the farm started?

Jessica: The farm was started in Spring of 2009.

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Hundreds of fruit trees and thousands more veggie saplings were given away at community garden on Sunday.

By David Fonseca
Mount Washington-Highland Park Patch
March, 2011

Excerpt:

The folks at Milagro Allegro Community Garden in Highland Park aren’t ones for false advertising.

For example, when they dub a fruit tree giveaway at their 115 S. Ave 56 plot “No Bare Root Tree Left Behind,” let’s just say that it’s advised you show up early if plan on taking home a fruit tree.

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Al Renner, 70, is a familiar name in Southern California community garden circles, legendary for his success in working the system to get more funds and land available for gardens throughout the county. As executive director of the Los Angeles Community Garden Council, he was intimately involved with the effort to heal the trauma from the 2006 destruction of the South Central Farm. He has started three community gardens: one in Silver Lake, one in Echo Park and, most recently, one in Solano Canyon. Photo by Ann Summa.

Link to 23 photos of gardeners and stories about the gardens.