Working together, local government and project planners could also retrofit older urban streets with attractive walkable streetscapes, just as Lansing, Michigan has done as part of its combined sewer overflow project
Newport, Robert, USEPA lecture to UPP 594 class 9/7/10 (below).
Some visionaries see even more dramatic transformations in the way we deal with water. Sarah Dunn and Martin Felsen of
Urbanlab envision Chicago’s evolution into a model city for “
growing water ” by creating a series of Eco-Boulevards that function as a giant Living Machine – treating the city’s waste and storm water naturally, using micro-organisms, small invertebrates such as snails, fish, and plants. Under their plan treated water would be returned to the Great Lakes Basin and create a closed water loop within Chicago, instead of being exported to the Mississippi and Gulf Coast.
Food
The ancients would wonder at modern supermarkets with their food from all over the world and fresh fruits and vegetables all year round. Yet most environmental activists advocate locally produced organic food. Peak oil will raise petrochemical costs and upset the dynamics of modern agriculture, but it will be difficult to change the acquired tastes of the consuming public.
USEPA is encouraging urban agriculture as one of the solutions to the shrinking city.
It sees urban agriculture as not only providing a use for vacant land, (thus addressing blight and the deleterious affect of neglect on property values) but also as a potential cleanup strategy for contamination. It addresses the problem of food deserts (lack of healthy, affordable, fresh produce) in blighted inner city neighborhoods while educating children and adults about farming and local enterprise. Practitioners have found that urban farming enhances social capital and community connections. Victory gardens produced about 40% of American vegetables consumed during World War II
and urban gardens could be a prime user of the compost that we could generate either through individual compost bins or through collective efforts performed on a large scale by our waste haulers.
Urban Agriculture Some new crops being started, protected by shade cloth barriers to the west. Note the new construction in the background. This area used to be all public housing. The high rise "warehouses of the poor" were torn down and are being replaced with mix of market-rate and low-income housing (also called mixed income housing.) The 1.5 acre parcel that City Farm sits on is owned by the City of Chicago and provided, rent-free, to this non-profit initiative. The property is valued at $8 million, however, so it's anyone's guess as to when the city decides to terminate the agreement and City Farm must move again.
Source: Linda from Chicago, USA (New crops) [
CC-BY-2.0 ] via
Wikimedia Commons
Many of us might belong to food cooperatives where the members contract with organic farmers to purchase the food grown for them.
In Sustainable Cities farming will not just be an interim land use in blighted neighborhoods but, like
Prairie Crossing in Grayslake, Illinois , will be an integral part of the community plan. Some even forecast
vertical farming in the great cities of the world.
OpenStax, Sustainability: a comprehensive foundation. OpenStax CNX. Nov 11, 2013 Download for free at http://legacy.cnx.org/content/col11325/1.43
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