Urban Farm Presentation

Last Saturday, we traveled to Cedar Rapids to present and gather your feedback on our urban farm design. We were very pleased to see that so many neighbors turned out to discuss the project with us, and your advice was very helpful in figuring out the completion of the urban farm project and the direction that this studio will take in the coming months. For those of you who couldn't be there, here's a summary of the work that we presented.

Site Context

The Ellis Urban Village is on the corner of F Avenue and Ellis Boulevard, in the area between Rumors Bar and Grill and the Diamond V Mills factory. The site is right on the edge of the 100-year floodplain and the levee construction zone, so normal residential construction would be difficult; as a result, part of the motivation for this project was a desire to introduce a new kind of rebuilding that could exist in a floodplain while still being a real part of the neighborhood.

Fields and Gathering Places

The purpose of the Ellis Urban Village goes beyond fields. In addition to produce-growing gardens for community-supported agriculture, it is meant to serve as a community gathering place that the neighborhood can take pride in. As a part of Cultivate Hope, the urban farm will host educational programs to teach the skills needed to grow fresh food. Beyond its use by Matthew 25, it will contain a play area for children, a pavilion that can be reserved for community events, and spaces for relaxation and reflection.

Growing in the Neighborhood

The urban farm is meant to beautify and lend an atmosphere of growth to the surrounding area. The farm fields will be garden plots designed to be tended with as little machinery and as much human care as possible. Planting will include a wide and colorful range of crops and vegetables throughout the year. The urban farm is meant to fit into the neighborhood, and so to conserve resources and help keep up the neighborhood's history and continuity, we'll be reusing or replacing existing buildings on the site whenever possible.

Play Area

The urban farm will be a place for the neighborhood to come together, learn and enjoy. Part of that goal is the inclusion of an interactive play space for children. There will be spaces to explore, climb, meet with friends and learn, as well as sitting places for resting parents. Imagination is the best of toys, and the urban farm will contain a wide variety of ways to exercise it for young and old alike.

Pavilion

The centerpiece of the urban farm will be a pavilion constructed at the heart of the farm, nestled between two existing garages that will be restored and reused for farm storage. In the heat of the summer, the pavilion will draw in cool summer wind while keeping the sun and rain off of classes and events. Movable dividers will make it possible to set aside part of the pavilion for a small group or open it up for a large event. As part of our goal of responsible resource use, the pavilion will also collect and store rainwater from its roof for use throughout the farm in times of little rain.

Storage and Demonstration

As the urban farm produces crops, there will be a need for on-site cool storage of vegetables while crops wait to be picked up. With some insulation and modifications to a normal window air conditioner, it's possible to convert a small room into a walk-in cooler without the expense. Another existing garage on site is the best candidate for conversion into this kind of storage space.

In addition to farming and community space, we want the urban farm to be educational and understandable. Some of the benches created to give the farm sitting space will also have an educational function, teaching by example how storm water can be collected and dealt with without flooding basements and overloading storm sewers.

Putting Plants to Work

The most important part of our strategy for dealing with storm water is the use of swales. Swales are shallow ditches filled with growing plants and absorbent soil. Water flows into swales and is absorbed into the ground slowly, filtering and safely dealing with any pollutants. We've placed swales in the path of water flow throughout the site, to absorb water from the farm before it flows onto neighbors' yards and streets. There are a variety of possible plants that will be grown in our swales, ranging from rows of stately trees when placed next to neighbors' lawns to thick, multi-level planting to quiet sound from the railroad.

Another creative use of plants that will be applied in the urban farm is the addition of a food forest. This will be an area planted with several levels of edible plants, ranging from low herbs and berry shrubs to taller fruit trees. In addition to growing delicious food, the forest will be a restful, shaded space for quiet contemplation.

Year-Round Production

To make the most use of the land, the urban farm will include a moveable greenhouse to lengthen the growing season. When sheltered in a greenhouse, some crops can be grown and harvested months earlier and later than would otherwise be possible. A greenhouse that can be moved on rails from site to site makes this process even more efficient, sheltering the hardiest crops first and moving on so that months can be added to production time. While other farm buildings are based in existing garages, the greenhouse will be placed in the site of an old house lot - by putting something there again, we want to help restore the image of the neighborhood and make the block more whole.

Urban Farm Open House

Over the past month, we've done a great deal of research into urban farming precedents and developed a range of possible designs for an urban farm in the heart of the Time Check neighborhood. Before the project moves forward, we're eager to discuss our work with the community and hear ideas about the future direction of this studio. To make our project more accessible, we'll be taking part in a public meeting this Saturday in Cedar Rapids.

The meeting will take place from 11-12 AM at Matthew 25's offices at 225 K Ave. NW and will be open to everyone. Representatives from Matthew 25, OPN, and local news will be on hand. We will bring a variety of our work for discussion and review. Please bring your questions, comments and ideas for improvement - we look forward to meeting with you!

Gulf Coast Trip Part 1 - Baton Rouge

We all headed out at 6 AM on Monday, January 30 for a 6-day trek in the Gulf Coast. The next several posts will show what we did and saw. It was a packed trip so be prepared!

After arriving in New Orleans, we picked up a van that ironically had Iowa license plates! We then drove to Baton Rouge via I-10. Baton Rouge is about 90 minutes north of New Orleans on the Mississippi River and almost all of the highway is essentially a bridge built over the cypress swamps surrounding Lake Ponchartrain and the river delta.

Jeff Carney at ISU students at the Coastal Sustainability Studio.

On Tuesday, we met with Jeff Carney, director of the Louisiana State University Coastal Sustainability Studio. The CSS in a research center in which faculty and students from a wide range of disciplines collaborate and work with federal, state, and local organizations to develop a better understanding of the river delta system and its implications for cities and neighborhoods. The CSS employs 15-20 graduate assistants from architecture, landscape architecture, and geography and has a great work space in the LSU College of Art + Design. 


The CSS approaches their projects using a transdisciplinary method and systems approach that informs design thinking and informed speculation, using information from the sciences to inform design ideas about how human settlement can exist in partnership with the complex river delta systems. The studio works to build capacity with the university through a lecture series, courses, and interactive website. They promote design resilience through their research and design projects, and they distribute their knowledge through design practice, outreach, and publications. They have worked on a wide array of projects including the 2012 Louisiana master plan, scenario-based alternatives for the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans, and a video on the rural community of Myrtle Grove done with the National Wildlife Federation. You can learn more about the CSS's projects at http://css.lsu.edu/.

Google Earth image of the arpent system along Bayou Lafourche.

At Jeff's suggestion, we had lunch at the Chimes in Baton Rouge, a restaurant in an old movie theater that is still used as a music venue. We then headed toward New Orleans via State Highway 1 along Bayou Lafourche. This route allowed us to see the French arpent system that divides land into long strips with settlement clustered along the bayou which acted as the transportation system. 

In an on-going search for alligators (who we subsequently learned are mostly sleeping at this time of year), we stopped near La Place and encountered a small gator up close and personal!


We then headed into New Orleans and checked into St. Vincent's Guest House, our accommodations for the next 4 nights. More on New Orleans and St. Vincent's in the next post!

Research on Urban Farm Precedents

In order to best prepare for designing the Ellis Urban Village, we began by researching many existing and planned urban farm projects. Urban farming is not an untested idea; in recent years, many groups throughout America and overseas have launched programs to bring high-intensity food production into close proximity with city-dwellers. These projects have ranged in scale from gardens atop the rooftop of one small building to studies of the possibility of planting crops throughout an entire city.

Throughout our research, several unifying principles of urban farming stand out. First, it is essential that a farm fit into the historical and social framework of the city in which it is built. Much like Cultivate Hope, every successful example of the urban farming movement has worked to achieve its goals by engaging the wider community and teaching farming techniques that are of lasting use to visitors. For example, the Lenape Edible Estate (right) is an urban farm attached to a children's center in the neighborhood of Chelsea in Manhattan. By partnering with school events, the project has drawn the lasting interest and support of local parents and community organizations. Originally based on the farming practices of the Lenape people who inhabited Manhattan centuries ago, the garden's programs teach both old and new methods of practical gardening. While not meant as a profit-making venture, the Lenape Edible Estate is successful in that it teaches visitors how to apply its lessons at home.

Such educated and sustainable 'Permaculture' practices are another guiding principle of urban farming. Plant species interaction, planting placement, growing cycles and composting must be made to work together for maximum yield and renewed soil. One example of these principles at work is Growing Power, Inc. (left), a very large-scale urban farm in Milwaukee. Growing Power has used a network of greenhouses to extend their growing season far beyond the normal range for produce-yielding plants in the Midwest.They also make use of efficient capture and storage of rainwater from their farm site to supply the water needs of their crops without having to pay to pump in water from outside. Both of these strategies will be put to use in the Ellis Urban Village.

Precedents large and small have demonstrated that urban farms can make a difference in the education and nutrition of cities and neighborhoods. We continue to research successful projects and explore the art and science behind urban farms as we work to help make Ellis Urban Village a reality.

About the Bridge Studio

 Welcome to the blog of the 2012 Cedar Rapids Bridge Studio! Over the course of the coming months, we'll use this space to post updates on our work and share research on related projects, practices and technology. Most importantly, we want to hear from you, whether you're a part of the studio, partnering with us, or live down the block from our projects. This blog is here as a forum for your input on our design decisions, so that we can work together for neighborhood growth and vitality in Cedar Rapids.

Our Studio

The Bridge Studio is an collaborative design program created to apply the learning experiences of student designers to aid in developing real solutions for Iowa communities. Our work brings together a diverse range of design professions, including graduate and undergraduate students in Architecture, Interior Design and Landscape Architecture. The Bridge Studio is planned and led by Assistant Professor Nadia Anderson of Iowa State University, who can be reached at nanderso@iastate.edu.

An energy-efficient home designed by the 2010 Corning Bridge Studio

Past iterations of the Bridge Studio have dealt with such issues as affordable housing, water management, gardening and green buildings created for and by Iowans. Since 2007, we've worked to bring together the latest developments in sustainable design and the needs of Iowa communities to help improve our state's quality of life while better educating a new generation of designers.

Our Projects and Partners

For our first project of 2012, we'll be working with Matthew 25 Ministries' Cultivate Hope program to design an urban farm to produce fresh produce in the heart of the Time Check neighborhood, as the first phase of the coming Ellis Urban Village. Like Cultivate Hope's existing farm (below right) the new farm will be based on shared ownership through Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) shares, dividing support and harvests among many participants in the neighborhood. Our design will be completed in late January and early February, with construction to begin in March.

Urban farm at the former Cedar Rapids Boys and Girls Club

In later months, we hope to expand our studio's goals to develop ideas for other needs and areas of opportunity in Cedar Rapids, including economic development, sustainable energy, and floodwater management. Your input is welcome and greatly desired to help us focus our work in the right direction.

We are grateful to OPN Architects for their assistance in providing expert advice and critique on the design challenges ahead. Likewise, we are glad for the ongoing help of the Northwest Neighborhood Association in teaching us about and connecting us with the neighborhood.

Thanks for tuning in - you'll find more news here on what we're doing and how you can be a part of it very soon!