Farming on American Roofs

One of many projects going on at the Majora Carter Group this summer, American City Farms is one of the heart healthiest. A project developed as a component of the urban farming movement, American City Farms will, hopefully, be one of the most influential projects developed; directly helping urban communities across the United States become hubs of fresh produce.

Hat tip to fellow intern Jason Segal for the following: American City Farms is a Local Foods project that will provide fresh produce to inner cities. Produce will be sourced from farms within a 100 mile radius of the destination city, from Urban Greenhouses developed by MCG, and from local community gardens. MCG will be opening projects in Detroit, MI ; Flint, MI; and Jackson, MS. The Greenhouses will use Aquaponics, a system that symbiotically cultivates plants & fish in a recirculating aquatic environment. Produce will be sold to local grocery stores, corner stores, and restaurants. The goal is to provide fresh and healthy produce to neighborhoods that sell mostly processed unhealthy food.

More to come on this, but in the meantime keep checking out the Brooklyn Grange Farm.

Hort. Infra in action.

for more info, there's a nice little mention about American City Farms in http://tiny.cc/q9xrf. and for MCG see http://www.majoracartergroup.com/

Farming among the clouds...of Long Island City, Queens

This Friday, granted I can escape the dungeons of my Firestone Library campus employment, I will be going to visit the Brooklyn Grange Farm in Long Island City, Queens with the Majora Carter Group! A commercial farming business, the Brooklyn Grange is located on NYC rooftops and grows vegetables in the city to sell to local people and businesses. In the vein of urban farming and horticultural infrastructure, the goal of the system is to improve access to healthy and good food, to connect city people more closely to farms and food production, and to make urban farming a viable enterprise and livelihood.

A large problem of inner city life is minimal access to fresh, healthy, and affordable food. With exciting innovation like this, city roofs are bringing better food closer to the American urban population.

As the ULTIMATE green roof, I can't wait to see what 37-18 Northern Boulevard, in Long Island City, Queens has to hold.

mmm. vegetables.

Green Collared Jobs for America's youth?

If you've read Van Jone's The Green Collar Economy, then you might know about the movement to green the United States economy via jobs based in "green" industries. In simplicity, a "green new deal", this proposal argues that there is the opportunity to create thousands of low- and medium-skill jobs that help conserve energy (for example, insulating older homes and buildings) or use alternate energy sources (solar panels). While providing jobs that can't be exported these positions also produce sustainable results in terms of construction, renovation, and community development. With appropriate incentives and programs these jobs can be created in inner cities and thereby also lift people out of poverty, providing an argument for environmental justice.

While building this new economy, one population to keep in mind is America's youth. President Obama recently identified the youth of America as one of the economically hardest hit populations and as a result has promoted the National Parks Service, and its affiliated components, as an outlet for teens and young adults to obtain a job while also restoring and rebuilding the National Parks. Though this is a great idea, I couldn't help wonder how this is helping inner cities, and overpopulated urban areas where the teen population is massive and the green works are lacking... Couldn't there be governmental work study programs implemented that apply this population while bettering concrete communities?

Just some thoughts.

Here are the links to Obama's touted programs for getting youth involved in environmental restoration in the National Park System.

* Youth Conservation Corps http://www.nps.gov/gettinginvolved/youthprograms/ycc.htm
* Public Lands Corps http://www.nps.gov/gettinginvolved/youthprograms/plc.htm
* Student Conservation Association http://www.nps.gov/gettinginvolved/youthprograms/scaopportunities.htm
* The Corps Network http://www.nps.gov/gettinginvolved/youthprograms/thecorpsnetwork.htm

Hort. Infra. isn't just a trend

HUD's blog (the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development) listed their top 8 green tips for American living. At number one? the strategic planting of shrubs and trees to reduce the heating and cooling costs, while also reducing storm water run-off and soil erosion. Horticultural infrastructure is fresh.

http://portal.hud.gov/portal/page/portal/HUD/press/blog/

Recyled Architecture

Aldwin Crooks sent this link to me. (shout out to JARED!)

http://www.nytimes.com/slideshow/2010/03/21/realestate/keymagazine/20100321-reuse-slideshow_5.html

AMAZING ideas. renovating, restoring, rebuilding, re-using. this is the type of stuff that architects need to be doing. What I would like to do, if I become an architect.

Green Roofing it UP

After taking a trial course for MCG (an environmental literacy course targeted at adults in the inner city to educate them on practical and sustainable water use) I couldn’t stop thinking about green roofs.

As a component of the course, we discussed LID practices: Low Impact Development practices. With LID, development is focused on low impact stormwater management where design attempts to mimic a site’s predevelopment hydrology by using design techniques that infiltrate, filter, store, evaporate, and detain runoff close to its source. This principle promotes treating stormwater through cost-effect landscape features to reduce the need for costly infrastructure built to transport and treat run-off. These landscape features, known as Integrated Management Practices (IMPs), are the building blocks of LID. Almost all components of the urban environment have the potential to serve as an IMP. This includes not only open space, but also rooftops, streetscapes, parking lots, sidewalks, and medians. LID is a versatile approach that can be applied equally well to new development, urban retrofits, and redevelopment / revitalization projects.

This all relates to the larger subject of horticultural infrastructure, but for now I’m keeping the discussion limited to green roofs. (As part of my internship I get to produce a research paper on hort. infra., so more to come soon). Green roofs are ANCIENT , GREEN, and provide an immense benefit to urban scapes around the world.

Consider these important statistics regarding greening up your roof: http://tiny.cc/hj6kc. Here we see that a green roof lasts an average of 30 years longer and uses only 70-80% of the energy consumed by a conventional roof. When applied correctly, greenroofs do all of the above:

Ø Clean and retain rainwater

Ø Reduce the overheating of cities (Urban Heat Island Effect)

Ø Add beauty to the concrete jungle

Ø Lower air temperatures

Ø Improve air quality

Ø Lower heating and cooling bills

Ø Extend the life of the roof membrane (2 to 3 times!)

Get it, GreenRoofs.

for more info, check out: http://www.lidstormwater.net/ and

http://www.artic.edu/webspaces/greeninitiatives/greenroofs/main_map.htm

Walmart Moms- greening constituents?

Neil Newhouse, co-author of Public Opinion Strategies, discussed an emerging new class of voters: the Walmart mom. “Walmart mom” constituents are interested in balancing the family budget in the face of “reduced hours at work, rising health care costs and increased energy prices”

• how do you interest this population in going green as well?> green voting

• Some sites relating to “Walmart moms” interested in going green (if they’re seen as a new and influential voting block then we should also view them as an important group to influence)

Filterforgood.com

30daystonatural.com- especially good for the penny-saving mom

Greenhome.com

waste-tailored recycling bins!

How ingenious is it to tailor the waste receptacles of recyclable material? Not only does it keep people from throwing the wrong material in the wrong can, but it makes you think twice when you're trying to shove your empty plastic water bottle into a rectangular slot designed for the disposal of newspapers, magazines, etc. I took this picture outside the Princeton Dinky at Princeton Junction this morning, where I unsuccessfully tried to throw away my breakfast before I realized a transparent shield was obstructing my trash's path. Made me think twice....about where I'm putting my trash