What's your plan for Chicago and her neighborhoods

Over at Curbed Chicago, I got wind of a Chicago Tribune challenge to Chicagoans. Inspired by the 100-year-old Burnham Plan, they want Chicagoans to come up with a plan of their own for the city. So then what caught my eye was reviving troubled city neighborhoods.

Some of those plans I'm sure have been implemented in some way. For example in some parts of the city such as Englewood there already are urban farms growing produce. Another good idea is mentorship for small business owners and tax breaks. Also creating commercial areas and parks as refuges with 24/7 security.

The article also considers what to do with the many schools that were closed due to utilization. Could these many buildings be used for commerical purposed or could they be used for community purposes. Indeed perhaps we could turn these closed schools into community centers with many services.

All the same, I'm sure many of you read this blog have your own idea as to reviving our troubled neigborhoods. Many of you have your own visions worth sharing with the Tribune or even here if you'd like.

The Chatham Urban Garden Takes Shape

Earlier this year, the Chatham Avalon Park Community Council (CAPCC)

in conjunction with Center for Regenerative Truth (CRT)organization held a fundraiser to fund the startup cost of the Chatham "The Color Green" Urban Garden. The garden sits on two lots on 82nd King Drive owned by CAPCC. The plan is teach urban farming to youth and veterans.

Previously, CAPCC planned to build a community center at this site and adjacent lots but funding and acquisition of lots for this project was difficult and has been put on hold.

What do you think?

Sun-Times: Mayor’s ‘strategic vision’ for seven neighborhoods

Recently Uptown Update took a look at recent plans Mayor Rahm Emanuel has made for seven neighborhoods around the city. Of course UU had something to say because these plans involved the Uptown neighborhood.

Today we look at communities on the south side that includes Englewood and Pullman which will be our focus. Of course we can provide an honorable mention to the Bronzeville neighborhood.

A “permanent farmer’s market” that could rival Seattle’s Pike’s Market. The nation’s longest protected bike lane. An Uptown Music District. A pedestrian bridge over Lake Shore Drive at 35th Street. An elevated, boardwalk bike trail at the Drive’s north end.

Those are just some of the ideas that could become a reality, thanks to a $3 billion plan that shows Mayor Rahm Emanuel is taking Daniel Burnham’s, “make no small plans” mantra to heart.

Emanuel has identified seven geographic areas brimming with either development or promise — Bronzeville, the Eisenhower Corridor, Englewood, Little Village, Pullman, Uptown and Rogers Park — and targeted those “Opportunity Planning Areas” for the City Hall equivalent of a full-court press.

With a combined, $2.65 billion in private sector and university projects on the drawing board, Emanuel wants to pump an additional $350 million in city money into those areas to accelerate the progress.

The city’s contribution would come in the form of federal, state, Park District and city land and transportation funds, as well as general obligation bonds and tax-increment-financing (TIF) districts.

“Usually, we’ll put in a train station. We’ll pave a road. We’ll put [in] some streetscape. And that was it. This is a more nuanced, coordinated effort … to make a series of investments in neighborhoods in a strategic vision,” Emanuel said in an exclusive interview with the Chicago Sun-Times.

Here's what's said about Englewood & Pullman:

Growing Home, INC Open House on August 25

This information is from a press release that was e-mailed to us:

Nonprofit organization Growing Home, Inc. will open its doors to the public for a free open house on Saturday, August 25, 2012, from 11:00 am – 3:00 pm at its Wood Street Urban Farm and Honore Street Farm at 5814 S. Wood Street, Chicago IL 60636. The open house will offer tours of Chicago’s first and only USDA Certified organic local farms within city limits. Also available will be a fresh-picked farm stand, cooking demonstrations and samples of fresh produce, gardening workshops, and activities for children.

Alex Kotlowitz writes in the July/August issue of Mother Jones, “Growing Home has altered the landscape of the neighborhood [Englewood]- and it employs local residents, many of whom because of past indiscretions have trouble finding work elsewhere.” Growing Home was honored on May 1, 2012 by the Cook County Board of Commissioners with a resolution honoring the organization’s 10th anniversary.

In 2012, Growing Home is expanding its farming operations to a new site, the Honore Street Farm, which is expected to triple production capabilities to 50,000 lbs. of local organic produce grown annually in Englewood, a recognized food desert on Chicago’s South side.

Here's a flyer below where you can find more details:

Lee Bey: Farming as a solution to the problem of vacant land

Basically Lee Bey's recent post uses Detroit's example to suggest urban farming in Chicago. In fact his first picture appears to be right in the Englewood neighborhood off of 63rd & Halsted. I believe in the past we have posted about an urban farm in the Englewood neighborhood.

Now Chatham isn't home to vast vacant lots of course that's not to say none exist. Well this post doesn't have to be limited to Chatham. The 6th Ward has some parts of Englewood in it as well.

The idea is until we do finally find something to build on the various vacant lots within our community we should turn them into gardens. Especially growing food if you believe we live in a "food desert". It would be a great service to the community instead of letting such lots grow weeds and collect trash of all kinds.

This reminds me I know that the CAPCC blog likes to throw out many ideas for the revitalization of Chatham. This ought to be one of them. Who knows if this community will be home to R&D companies and foster the next technology entrepreneur.

Then again who knows if a Wal-Mart will ever be built at Chatham Market. Until it is decided what will be built there that is a perfect place for a garden or urban farm. Well perfect unless it's time for a ground breaking for whatever will be placed there on the site.

What do you think about gardens/urban farms in our community?

Urban fish farming in Chicago

I think that this has been hinted at with Ald. Lyle whether you visit her monthly meetings or you read her monthly newsletters. She is in fact quoted in this article from the past week in the Tribune:

The idea of a fish farm in the middle of the city can seem quirky. Sometimes when 6th Ward Ald. Freddrenna Lyle brings up the subject, "people look at me as if they thought I had two heads," she said.

But raising fish in an urban area is a clean, organic way to grow food, proponents say. It puts vacant lots and old industrial buildings to good use, which is why another alderman has become a proponent, and creates jobs. If done right, advocates say, there's no smell and no pollution, since the fish wastewater is recirculated to irrigate vegetables and herbs.

"And you never have to worry about a loose fish bothering the neighbors," says Myles Harston, who owns AquaRanch Industries in Flanagan, Ill., and has set up about 500 systems nationwide.

But it will be a while before the idea may catch on in Chicago.

Fish cannot be farmed in the city on a commercial scale. Although Chicago's zoning codes say nothing explicitly about fish, they are classified as livestock, said Ald. Helen Schiller, who is working to build an aquaponic fish farm in a boarded-up building in her 46th Ward.

So far, only institutions that raise fish for educational purposes can do it. But Schiller, Lyleand urban agriculture advocates are trying to change that.

They are working with the city to write comprehensive guidelines for growing food in the city. An ad hoc committee, consisting of staff members from the departments of zoning and land use planning, buildings, environment and public health, are looking at such things as health requirements and building standards, waste disposal and where the soil comes from. For now, the committee is focusing on plant-based farming, but eventually it will take a look at urban fish farming.

Mentioned in this article is Chicago High School for Agricultural Sciences (also known once upon a time as Chicago Ag) located in the Mt. Greenwood community. They already grow fish at that. Perhaps we could hire some of those students to work at these fish growing facilities whereever they may be. Or pehaps interest other students to work in this field. Especially if they're interested in the sciences or agriculture.

Read the whole thing!

Also check out this YouTube video which shows the activites at an urban farm in Milwaukee, Wisconsin where one activity is raising fish.

Chicago Tonight Urban Farms

Was this the Urban Farm that I had posted about over the summer? This segment aired on Chicago Tonight on November 19th although unfortunately there was mention of a farmer's market in Lincoln Park that has passed by the time this is published.

Wood Street Urban Farm in Englewood

I found a vid on this over at The Concerned Citizens of Chatham Facebook page. I knew that vid was from a local TV outlet but alas there wasn't any identifiers. Then I found this video over at this ChicagoNow blog, Chicago Garden:

The Wood Street Urban Farm is a USDA Certified organic production farm in Chicago's Englewood neighborhood. It was started in 1992 by Les Brown, Director of Policy for the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, who passed away in 2005, as a training program for the homeless and jobless. Today, the Wood Street Urban Farm employs 30 part-time workers, including ex-offenders, and provides job training while helping to alleviate the food desert problem in the area. They estimated they'd grow about 10,000 lbs of produce this year on just 2/3 of an acre. You can see a photo gallery at the Sun-Times website and a segment from CLTV below that profiles the urban farm.
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You can support Growing Home by purchasing their organic produce every Wednesday. 100% of the proceeds goes to improving their job training program and the costs of operating their farms sites. They're also in need of office supplies and equipment like; Flash drives, filing cabinets, book shelves, copy machines, notebooks, binders, staplers and farm tools. You can contact the administrative office at 2732 N. Clark, Suite 310, Chicago, IL 60614. Tel 773-549-1336

The Growing Home Farm is located at 5814 S. Wood. This would be a great place to pay a visit, yes?

BTW, go over to that blog and look at the various produce you can grow in your own backyards. :)

ALSO, here's a website to the Wood Street Urban Farm courtesy of Growing Home, Inc's website!