Living in a large city like New York, LA or DC has its perks: museums, films, music, lectures, public transportation.  There’s an amazing amount of human diversity crammed into a relatively small geographical space. The culinary options alone are worth the experience.  However, there’s an obvious lack of green space and available land for growing food. Asphalt, pavement, highways and overpasses, parking lots and high-rise buildings leave most of the soil compacted below an impenetrable layer of human “progress.”   In many cases, the soils that do remain are heavily contaminated with the legacy of decades of industrial activity – lead, mercury, petrochemicals, to name a few – which make eating vegetables grown there a serious health risk.

In response, a growing wave of urbanites around the country are re-assessing city spaces and growing food in the most wonderful and peculiar places.  (more…)