Interested in starting a community garden? Some UB students may be able to help you this Thursday at the Buffalo Museum of Science.
Dr. Samina Raja of the University at Buffalo's School of Architecture and Planning has set her Planning Food for Justice class into action as the result of a call for help from the City of Buffalo's Community Garden Task Force.
The class was assigned to assess the current status of Buffalo's Community Gardens, and look at ways to help initiate and integrate future gardens. Once their research is complete, students will present their findings and recommendations to the City of Buffalo Community Gardens Task Force.
"We're in the process of preparing a plan to create and sustain community gardens and work out the details of the process," Dr. Raja said.
Dr Raja explained that this is part of the students' semester project, to be completed by the end of the school year. With plenty of time to deliberate results of the student recommendations, the Task Force has until the end of 2009 to present their response to the City of Buffalo. Though Dr. Raja says it's not possible to implement the plan in its entirety before the 2009 growing season, which is nearly upon us, she doesn't doubt that some self-starters from the community will glean what they need to from the breakout sessions on Thursday, implementing their own projects for this season.
"Immediate short term steps could be taken," Dr. Raja stated. "It's a great time for the community to form and self-organize. I'm allowing the students to take the lead. I am also on the Task Force, but I will help guide the student work." Raja pointed out that there is a sub-crew in the class, in charge of community visioning, and that they may be able to help some things happen this year.
Those
who can't attend can participate through written comments until Friday, April 3rd. Reach the student group through email, and visit Queen City Gardens on Facebook and queencitygardens.blogspot.com
Thursday, March 19, 2009
5:30pm - 7:00pm
Buffalo Science Museum
1020 Humboldt Pkwy #1
While I applaud whole heartedly the taking on of this project, it seems that some thought needs to be given the appropriateness of the sites from a LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE perspective in addition to neighborhood conditions, access and land use studies. Particularly with urban sites, things like soil conditions, soil toxicity, compaction, permeability, wind conditions, sun exposure, invasive weed infestation are all items to be seriously considered.
Maybe it would be good to have the students coordinate with a local landscape architect to see that these important elements are not overlooked in the selection of sites. A good resource to find one would be to contact the NY Upstate Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects. They can be found at http://www.nyuasla.org/