Urban Garden Center
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This is the original plan to use these two vacant city-owned lots of the old Santa Fe Railroad line for a model urban garden center. The project is being implemented and managed by Spiral Gardens, a nonprofit organization, formerly merged with the BOSS Urban Gardening Institute. It was approved through a use permit process that included a door-to-door survey of hundreds of neighborhood residents. With their overwhelming approval, as well as that of neighborhood councils, a long list of local organizations and merchants, the Parks and Recreation Commission, and the City of Berkeley Planning Department, the proposal was passed unanimously by the Berkeley City Council.
The project is designed to offer much more than the usual community garden. There are four main elements:
Organic
Retail Nursery - specializing in useful plants for food, medicine,
and ecological restoration and info on how to use them. Proceeds go
to support the project.
Produce Stand - selling fresh organic fruits and vegetables from
regional farmers at the lowest prices possible in order to bring good
food into the community.
Food Garden - bringing volunteers together to grow bountiful
organic food. Half of the harvest goes to homeless shelters and seniors
and half to the folks who grow it.
Outdoor Community Classroom - will be providing a place to host
a regular schedule of free classes where people can share knowledge
about self-sufficiency through gardening, skills for good eating habits,
and tools to build a healthier city.
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on any of the thumbnails pics below for a higher resolution image.
