Previously, I wrote about an exciting project on the South Side of Chicago called The Plant. As part of this “vertical farming” project the Plant has a new tenant that will be growing on the rooftop. The Urban Canopy’s vision is to show how rooftop farming is a vital part of the urban agriculture movement to create a sustainable and equitable food system. For 2012, The Urban Canopy will build a 3000 square feet farm on the rooftop!
This farm will produce over 2500 pounds of fresh fruits and veggies in the first year alone. The main growing methods will include a combination of automatically irrigated raised beds, bucket-ponics, and lightweight hydroponic systems. Lots of pictures are posted on TUC’s flickr page. Once the farm is operating, the plan is to hire a few employees from the Back of the Yards community. A portion of the produce will be donated to local food banks and sold at reduced rates to neighborhood residents; the remaining portion will be sold directly at farmers markets and to green restaurants.
This project is currently going through a Kickstarter Campaign to raise the funds required to actually build the farm out in March. Consider pledging to the campaign to see exactly how you can enable this concept and rooftop farming overall. The various rewards include sustainable gear like organic cotton t-shirts/bags, tours of the building and rooftop farm, a veggie share of the 2012 produce, even up to a catered dinner ON the rooftop or naming rights to the farm! Alex also told me that there will be volunteering opportunities and other ways to get directly involved throughout the year. Please share this link with your friends and family to help the project: http://kck.st/zMSuQD.
Thanks so much for listening to us tell you about this awesome project in Chicago!
The rehab of a former meat-processing plant on Chicago’s South-side may seem a strange place to start a project documenting green change in food systems across the American Midwest, yet that is precisely where the web-series “Redefining Roots” begins. A fortunate meeting led me to get acquainted with Michael Silberman, the brains behind Great Eye in the Sky Productions, the company spearheading the project. Michael has shared some tremendous insight with me to give our followers a glimpse into his big dream documentary series ~ A Sustainable Reality – Redefining Roots. Michael is currently doing a documentary on an apt place then, to start a series focused on innovative local food solutions. From urban markets and production, to local organic farms, Redefining Roots profiles the projects of local growers and entrepreneurs re-shaping America’s food system, one seed at a time.
Now why is that of interest to us at RoofTopGarden.com, you ask? Well according to Michael, Plant Chicago will have multiple green roofs and vertical building growth! Plant Chicago led by John Edel will have a rooftop garden and apiary along with vertical growth along the sides of the building. Hops will be grown on the side of the building which will be harvested and used by The New Chicago Brewing Company (a sustainable brewing operation) within The Plant. Also, Bubbly Dynamics, John’s previous success story, also Chicago’s first sustainable manufacturing center already has a fully flourishing rooftop garden which Michael has provided pictures of. According to Michael, a really cool thing about this particular rooftop garden is that it actually creates a picture of John’s daughter when you view it from space! Michael has provided photos of that as well for us to enjoy!
As far as “Plant Chicago”, this former meat-processing facility, is a zero-energy sustainable green business incubator, and it will house an aquaponic farm, fish hatchery, micro-brewery, and 40,000 square foot shared kitchen, all powered by an anaerobic digester.
Part documentary series, part how-to, part “Mr. Rogers goes to the crayon factory,” Redefining Roots traces the interconnections in “green” food systems. Its main highlights being innovative and sustainable techniques that bring food from farm to fork, meeting plenty of insightful characters along the way. More than just an online show, Redefining Roots focuses on empowering its viewers by means of information, connection, and instruction. Redefining Roots encourages viewers to get involved by sharing content and ideas for new projects. It also hopes to inspire viewers to work with, or on, projects profiled in the show. As an online media channel, Redefining Roots connects problem solvers from differing fields and regions while encouraging DIY experimentation and providing an outlet for otherwise less visible, but no less essential, “green” projects.
There are plenty of food related problems out there: from the epidemics of diabetes and obesity, to urban food deserts, to unsustainable resource use in farming, to greenhouse gas emissions from food production. Thankfully, there are plenty of clever people working to address these problems. There’s no single solution, and the projects profiled on the show, even the show itself, are only small parts of a sustainable future; but the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. We need each other’s help. Let’s unite and find our voice, so that together we can manifest our sustainable reality and do what is needed to redefine our roots.
A huge thank you to Jean-Claude Goldenstein for his efforts with the CRE portal CreoPoint. Jean-Claude is bringing the world of CRE together in one place. He has even brought our greening efforts together, which is so very necessary. Good news, like the world’s largest green wall is hard to come by and thanks to CreoPoint it is here for the PM / FM industry to embrace and understand.
The concept of green walls is as outstanding as its sibling, green roofs. It is simply a fascination for so many folks, but it is truly proving to be more than that. It is becoming a standard to achieve. A hallmark of excellence, if you will. The ingenious of this concept is that it is a sign, but it is a green sign. How can you argue with the beauty of a green sign? The sign industry better watch out because this will definitely catch on and bring life and green to the cold, hard-to-soften high-rise or skyscraper.
Kudos to Green Living Technologies and the PNC on this project. Now I just have to get them to list the project on the Rooftop Garden World database!!
I feel like I try so hard to keep up on reading and researching everything possible about urban gardening and rooftop gardens and green roofs, green walls, and vertical gardens, etc. Today, I was sent a tweet by THKTNK aka http://www.arkit.com.au/. It was about a group called Urban Reforestation in Melbourne, Australia. That was a first for me. What about you? It is a group of folks trying to make a difference in Melbourne by bringing farming or what we call, greening, to their city.
This is their mission: Urban Reforestation is a creative global campaign aiming to inspire urban farming for sustainable lifestyles and food security. Starting in metropolitan Melbourne. From the photographs, it appears to be on a rooftop. So we have another great catch phrase to be aware of. I like it, but when I think of reforestation, I think of big trees, but it still works for me. I may be the clueless one, but I never heard of that term so I thought I would share it.
The group is too busy gardening to finish their website, but they do have one and I think it will be great. They also have a Facebook site as well. Here is how you can find them. We can thank my Twitter friend for the plug.
