Design and Landscape For Healthy Living

City Farm Chicago

I recently read Design and Landscape for People–a collection of case studies highlighting renewal efforts worldwide–and find myself reflecting on two particularly inspiring projects. Both of which embrace our socio-cultural connection with agriculture and seek out ways to celebrate that connection within the context of our urban environments.

The first is the Dorset based non-profit organization called Common Ground, which celebrates one’s locality and agricultural heritage as a starting point for taking action to transform urban spaces. Notable urban agriculture projects include efforts to save vulnerable orchards, educating persons on the historical significance of local apple varieties and organizing the planting of new apple trees and orchards. The organization’s year long efforts culminate in annual Apple Day festivals held all over England where time is set aside for villagers to celebrate their agricultural heritage.

The second case study is the Mobile City Farm project based in Chicago. This project is the a recent initiative of The Resource Center, a non-profit environmental education organization. The project transforms vacant, publicly owned lots into valuable assets for the community by establishing temporary, urban farms. Food grown on these urban oases is either sold directly to the surrounding neighborhood or to local restaurants. Once the vacant lot becomes desirable for development, the City Farm can easily move to another location and be established in less than a month, hence ensuring long-term viability for the project.

These case studies highlight the many opportunities we have here in the Puget Sound region to implement similar projects such as planting fruit trees in our planter strips, nurturing orchards in our parks, and establishing urban farms on underutilized sites. The City of Seattle is currently looking at policy changes relating to local food production that will hopefully seize some of these exciting opportunities. In the meantime, we are all capable of doing our part by just simply planting a fruit tree or a vegetable garden this spring!

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