School is back in session, and as promised, we will be bringing you all sorts of sustainability questions and stories to sink your teeth into.  Speaking of food-for-thought (or just food for that matter) Grist recently ran a series of articles entitled “Feeding the City” that examine the intricate web of food production for (and in) urban areas throughout the country.   The series delves deep into the urban food system, examining everything from urban food expenditures to the conversion of vacant urban land to productive vegetable plots.

Special attention is given to urban agriculture in the series. It explores the capacity of urban agriculture, not only in terms of tons produced, but also in less tangible outcomes such as community empowerment and education.

Urban farmer Annie Novak of Eagle Street Farm in Brooklyn sums up some of the more subtle benefits of growing food in the city in her interview for the series. When speaking about urban farming, she says:

“You work hard, and that is the most difficult and the most rewarding thing about it. This year, we’ve had one of the hottest summers that I’ve ever experienced. It’s been devastating to watch what that does to the plants. At the same time, the beauty of agriculture is that it comes in cycles. It gives you a real patience. That consciousness hopefully makes you a better environmental steward, because you have that long-term sensibility. How different that is from the way technology asks us to think today, with such immediate demands.”

The opening piece of the series, entitled “The History of Urban Agriculture Should Inspire Its Future,” is written by Grist Food editor Tom Philpott. In it, Philpott also identifies urban agriculture as a means of building more sustainable cities, and not simply in terms of offset carbon emissions from food miles. He recognizes the reality that cities will need larger foodsheds beyond their geographic boarders to feed their populations. But he also contends that “cities need not, and indeed likely cannot, continue as pure consumers of food and producers of waste. Intensive production of perishable vegetables, fertilized by composted food waste, can bring fresh produce to food deserts, provide jobs as well as opportunities for community organizing, and also shrink a city’s ecological footprint.”

Image Via Grist

I thought of this speech today while watching this month’s installment of Currents, in the New Yorker. In it, Paul Goldberger, the magazine’s architecture critic sat with Richard Cook, a partner at Cook+Fox Architects. These are the guys that brought us the Bank of America Leed Platinum building. At one point, while Cook is discussing the variety of nature that he watched blossom outside his window atop a green roof, he says nature is complex but it is simply “life following life,” and that this is a guiding force in the new architecture that they are thinking about. An architecture where the distinctions between the built and natural are blurring.

It is a 25 minute video, which seems like hours in our rapid media world, but it covers logistical issues: LEED standards have been criticized, are they enough? And more conceptual ideas: How do we start to build things, en masse, that are as beautiful as natural things? Cook alludes to a project they are working on in Syracuse called Live | Work | Home, a house that mimics the light that penetrates the floor of a rainforest through its canopy.  He discusses biophilia, E.O. Wilson’s idea that, simply put, humans are intrinsically drawn to other living systems. And this is precisely what made me think of the Paul Hawken speech that I initially alluded to. In it, he reminds us that we are all here because one cell, said yes, to another. “Life creates conditions that are conducive to more life.” Now, its time to get the built “life” of the planet, our cities, on board in this exercise in reciprocity and resilience.

Image via Discovery Channel

I have to admit that whenever sharks come across the wire, my ears perk up. I had a fascination with sharks as a kid and to this day a significant portion of my brain is still devoted to the random shark trivia I learned when I was eight. While my professional life has moved well beyond my elementary school shark fascination, I still pay attention to the world’s shark happenings. Which is what brings me to today’s topic of discussion: shark finning.

Shark finning is a fairly barbaric fishing practice in which a shark is caught, its fins are cut off, and its body is thrown back alive to die in the water. Last Saturday, the award-winning documentary Sharkwater by filmmaker Rob Stewart premiered on the Discovery Channel. The documentary sheds light on the practice of shark finning and multiple social media outlets such as Gothamist and the NRDC blog have jumped on board to spread the message about the practice’s devastating effects.

Sharks have evolved over millions of years to be the ocean’s top predators. This includes a very slow reproductive process that for millennia has enabled an equilibrium between the populations of sharks and their prey. Today, tens of millions of sharks are being pulled from the water for their fins every year. Shark populations can’t recover fast enough, and some species are nearing extinction. This in turn has destabilized marine populations all the way down the food chain.

So what, you ask, does this have to do with cities? A great deal actually. This multi-billion dollar shark-finning industry is fueled by primarily urban consumption of the delicacy shark fin soup. The demand comes mostly from China, where this soup has been consumed for centuries. However, the recent rise of China’s affluent middle class has sent demand through the roof. It isn’t just China though. Restaurants in cities around the world are now selling shark fin soup. It is even on a few menus right here in New York City.

Even though sharks aren’t walking around 5^th Ave, shark finning is still very much an urban issue, and is intimately intertwined with the sustainability of the world’s cities. We can construct as many eco-villages or green buildings as we want, but until we face the impacts of urban living that extend well beyond the borders of our cities (in this case, deep into ocean waters), the concept of sustainable cities will remain just that: an idea.

While public sympathy for sharks can be a bit difficult to drum up (they aren’t exactly the ocean’s most cuddly creatures), the reality is that they hold a vitally important place in the ocean’s ecosystem that is being threatened by trends in urban consumption. Some countries have taken steps to protect sharks from the practice of finning, and many restaurant owners have pledged to keep shark fin soup off their menus. Yet much more still needs to be done. A global commitment is needed to protect sharks (and ultimately the ocean) from the devastation embodied in a seemingly innocuous bowl of soup.

Image Via Discovery Channel

This is the potential scenario that confronted New Yorkers who stopped by the CISC table at the City of Water Day (hosted by the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance), which took place July 24^th on Governor’s Island. CISC was one of many organizations on hand to talk to participants about various water-related issues. At the CISC table, attendees viewed a map of 1 in 100 year flood events developed by the New York City Panel on Climate Change (NPCC).

For anyone who may not be familiar with the NPCC, it is a panel of climate science experts convened by Mayor Bloomberg, modeled on the IPCC, and co-chaired by CISC’ own Dr. William Solecki to evaluate the impact of climate change on New York City. Earlier this year, the panel released a report of their findings that includes an assessment of the progression of severity of 1 in 100 year flood events (or flooding that has a 1% chance of taking place every year) under a rapid ice-melt scenario. It is clear from looking at the map depicting this flooding that the areas impacted will increase over decades to come.

The communication of climate science is a complicated matter, which we as a society still haven’t quite figured out yet. As I watched people grapple with this one small piece of climate change information and how to respond to it on a post-it note, the reasons for this hit home. Instead of just talking at them, we asked people to engage with the map by sharing their thoughts and questions on post-it notes.

Here is a snapshot of some of the things people wrote:

• Uh oh, there goes the beautiful Riverside Park! Make for the Highline!
• My house is under water.
• Need to stop global warming! ASAP
• How will this impact the landfill that makes up parts of Manhattan?
• I find the whole thing too depressing to think about.
• I had thought that the whole city was at risk of being submerged, or even the whole coast – thanks for the clarification, re-education, and dissemination.
• How will they keep subways pumped out?
• One of those things we’re just going to have to live with cause there is no easy solution.

Some people (many of whom appeared to already have knowledge of the topic) were eager to share their thoughts, knowing exact what they wanted to say.  Others mulled it over, even struggled to figure out how to connect with what was in front of them. Comments ranged from personal to global and tongue-in-cheek to highly serious. Still other event-goers chose not to write anything, a number of them stating something along the lines of “I don’t know what to say.”

As I spoke with people and listened to their thoughts, is seemed to me that in order to really connect with these highly technical climate science concepts, people needed to be able to repackage them in meaningful and personal ways. Those who could, often wrote something down on a post-it. Those who couldn’t, generally walked away without doing so.  Yet, I feel I learned as much from listening to people who chose not to participate as from those who did.

Becoming empowered to do something about climate change requires 1) that people connect with the information in front of them and 2) that people believe that their actions can make a difference- whether on the personal or the policy level. Millions of people across the country already do this. Still, we need to figure out how to involve millions more. It seems to me that asking people to engage with these concepts, instead of viewing them as passive recipients of information, is an important and promising first step, even if they do walk away the first time around.

I took some of our fabulous CISC interns on a kayaking voyage up the Bronx River a few weeks ago. And this is what they had to say about it.

“New Yorkers tend to think inwards and underground about their city: Central Park and the subway. But lately, this has been changing.  Boating organizations and environmental groups have sprung up in the past half-century to increase awareness of the waterways critical condition and importance to the City.  As summer outreach and planning interns, we decided to take a kayak trip with one of these organizations, the Bronx River Alliance, to experience hands on the effects of the City on our waterways.

The Bronx River, New York City’s only freshwater river, runs 23 miles long from the Kensico Dam in upper Westchester County through 13 Westchester municipalities to where the East River converges with Long Island Sound. This once beautiful and thriving body of water is now a contaminated conduit for industrial and residential wastes.

The Bronx River Alliance formed in 1974, has taken remarkable strides in trying to restore this river back to its original serenity. This organization develops community outreach initiatives, conducts research on the River’s ecology and serves as an advocate for the River and its surrounding community. BRA’s work illustrates how dedicated citizens who are adamant about preserving our environment can and do make a difference.

However, their hard work is not immediately evident upon emerging from the Hunt’s Point subway station. We had never been to Hunts Point, but we were aware of the controversial developments of Robert Moses and their devastating toll it  had on the Bronx.  As we walked toward the Bruckner Expressway overpass, it wasn’t hard to see that the area is plagued with social ills. In a city as wealthy as New York, the hard truth is that poor communities bare the brunt of environmental ravages. The built environment of Hunts Point is a veritable death trap. The expressway is at least 5 lanes across, with no pedestrian walkway to be spoken of; truck after truck barrel down the road, amidst incessant car honking and exhaust fumes. Walking up the crumbling steps to cross the gritty overpass, was not welcoming. In lieu of shrubs and flowers, the overpass offered only concrete and graffiti.

Crossing the bare concrete overpass, we entered Concrete Plant Park. With parched grass, a lack of trees and no real social gathering point, the “park” falls desperately short of being an inviting public space. It would be hard to imagine a similar scene anywhere in Manhattan. In Hunt’s Point and other parts of the Bronx, the environmental inequity that exists between those communities that receive waste and those that produce it – those that dump and those that get dumped on – is hard to miss.

As we set off in our kayaks, we saw a garbage dump, a scrap metal recycling center, and parking lots lining a good portion of both riverbanks.  As we passed, we noticed a certain stench.  It would be simple to conclude that the smell originated from these concrete yards of the industrial age.  However, even in areas where trees line the river, the smell lingered.  Why?  The smell didn’t come from the dump; it came from the water itself.

In theory, the water shouldn’t be polluted.  The City’s fourteen water purification centers can process all the water used and release a purified form back into its estuaries.  So why is there sewage in the water?  Because of NYC’s antiquated sewage planning.  The city uses a combined sewage overflow system (CSO) to handle both human waste and regular runoff water.  This type of system accounts for 70% of the NYC sewage system according to the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYCDEP). On a normal, rainless day, the system is able to collect and process all of the fluids running through the system.  However, when it rains, there is too much water for the system to handle, and thus the overflow water is redirected straight to the estuaries, untreated.  That means raw sewage –shoots straight into the river.  To contextualize, Hunt’s Point’s largest CSO, CSO 007, collects an estimated 1.7 million floatables (garbage and solid matter) each year.

Despite the smell, and the murky water filled with human biproducts, we paddled along. Our guide Miguel began pointing things out to us, that the river is an ecological home, not a deserted wasteland and that there is a vibrant ecological community regenerating along the Bronx River in Hunt’s Point. The contaminated and brackish waters are home to unusual species of edible plants and a host of wildlife. Along the banks of the river rare conifers, fruit trees and medicinal plants such as Mugwort thrive.  Japanese Knotwood grows rampant-a vestige of a naturalist’s planting from the 1850s and indicative of the rich biological history of the area.

We saw Egret and Heron that nest along the river. Striped Bass and Blue Fish are indigenous, and although not advisable to eat, neighborhood fishermen cannot be dissuaded.  We witnessed a gentleman bathing en plein air just a stone’s throw from the ominous CS007, and a rope swing was rigged up in a tree where kids jump into the river to swim. Community youth were also exploring the River along with us. Miguel introduced them as youth from, Rock the Boat - an organization that trains youth in traditional boat building and water ecology.

Wrapping up the three and a half hour trip, we emerge tired and with mixed feelings.  On one hand, it’s pretty depressing to see the state of the river due to the lack of foresight when creating the sewage system, and how we haven’t moved to significantly clean up the area.  Also, people shouldn’t have to live around these conditions. But on the other hand, organizations like the Bronx River Alliance and Rock the Boat increase exposure to these issues so that they don’t go unnoticed.  And at the same time, young people out on the water are gaining valuable skills while they hopefully, become more engaged in solutions and the restoration of  these important places.

Earlier today, I had the pleasure of sitting down with my friend and fellow urban planning student Heidi Exline one last time before she heads off to India for nine months. In less than two weeks, she will be leaving for Ludhiana (a city of around a million people several hours north of Delhi) to study community food security on a Fulbright Fellowship. This spring, Heidi finished her Master of Urban Planning (MUP) at Hunter College with a concentration in sustainable community food systems. She is just one of the many CUNY students and alums doing noteworthy work, both in New York City and beyond.

Heidi’s interest in food didn’t begin in India. It didn’t even begin in New York City for that matter. Heidi’s love of food began as a child, growing up on a farm in Iowa. While she wasn’t at all interested in the corn and soybeans her father grew, she did love cooking with him. She took that love of food with her when she moved to New York City.

During her first four years here, Heidi was employed as a social worker, indulging her interest in food by cooking and eating out at New York City’s many restaurants.  However, after four years in social work, Heidi still hadn’t found her niche. She turned to food full time and accepted a job working at Murray’s Cheese.  It was then that she decided to pursue food as a career, and spent a summer in Vermont learning to make goat cheese.

Upon returning to New York City, Heidi found it hard to find a job in the cheese world that fit her interests. At the same time, her interests in community education and the non-profit sector began to grow and she eventually landed a job at City Harvest. For the next four years, Heidi enjoyed immersing herself in food. Through City Harvest, she worked with regional farmers and food rescue programs, while reading books about food and taking food-related classes at Hunter College. Two years ago, Heidi returned to school full time to pursue a graduate degree in planning, constructing a self-designed concentration in community food security.  While in school, she also worked on food issues and policy for Speaker Christine Quinn’s office.

As Heidi headed towards graduation, she began looking for opportunities to work in her field abroad. With the sponsorship of a professor from the Punjab Agricultural University, Heidi eventually applied to and won a Fulbright Fellowship in Ludhiana. While there, her goal is to piece together the stories of the many residents of the region into a community food assessment that will empower the community to improve food security and access.

For herself, Heidi is also hoping to learn about the connections between food and agriculture in India and the U.S. In her words: “our food system doesn’t happen in a silo – no pun intended.” Learning about these connections will inform and strengthen the work she does in India, as well as the work she will do here in the States upon her return. In the end, she wants to better understand urban-rural linkages and how cities can support sustainable regional food systems.  Understanding these sorts of linkages and how they can contribute to sustainability is something that we are all about here at the Institute. We wish Heidi the best of luck in her pursuit.

Brooklyn Window Farm

Today I had one of those days where the stars aligned. It just so happened that those stars were food and technology.

I checked my Facebook page today and found that a friend had invited me to “like” the group Brooklyn Homesteader, an information sharing online resource about urban agriculture recently started by hobbyist farmer Megan Paska from Greenpoint. Usually I ignore these sorts of messages, but being an urban ag enthusiast, I had to accept.

Later, I received an email from the Comfood listserv (sponsored by the Community Food Security Coalition and administered through the Tufts School of Nutrition Science and Policy) that included a link to the blog food + tech connect, about food and technology. It includes an interesting post about the importance open data in agriculture.

This all got me thinking about the role of technology, specifically digital media, in food production. Over the past century, with urbanization and the mechanization of agriculture, the share of Americans making their living from farming has dwindled from 90% in the late 1800s to around 2% today. With it, has gone much of the cultural knowledge about how to grow food.

Agriculture in the U.S. faces many challenges, most of which can’t be solved by digital media (or at least digital media alone). Yet, one of the things that dawned on me as I mulled over these various online farming resources is just how much of a contribution digital media can make in preserving institutional agricultural memory. Sites such as Brooklyn Homesteader are popping up across the web to assist everyone from hardcore gardeners to urban residents curious about how to grow their first tomato. Others go further by offering bricks-and-mortar opportunities for people to get their hands into the dirt. For instance, type “farm internships” into your search bar and pages upon pages of options come up.

This online urban agriculture movement is distinct because of the power of information sharing over the web. Hobby farmers in New York can swap ideas with beekeepers in Vancouver or food security activists in Detroit. Meanwhile, anyone with access to an internet connection anywhere in the world can learn from their experiences, as well as tell their own stories. While urban farms and community gardens in New York will never look like those in California, the ability of farmers across the country and the globe to instantaneously share their experiences is truly revolutionary.

As part of its 25th anniversary, Summer Stage has branched out from its home base in Central Park, with over 100 events at venues across the city, in all five boroughs. For a full line up, visit the Summer Stage site.

The events to be held at the East River Park venue will offer free bike valet parking, as the foundation has partnered with the wonderful folks over at Transportation Alternatives. The idea behind the collaboration is to “give greater access to cyclists…and to provide an incentive to utilize alternative means of transportation, and promote the use of green spaces in the Lower East Side.”

The service begins at the event on Tuesday, August 4th and will continue for the duration of the 13 days of free public programming at that venue. Roll on over and hand your bike off to the experts.

From the press release:

In March 2010, the IPCC received approximately 3,000 nominations. At the Bureau session held in Geneva, 19-20 May 2010, the three working groups presented their selected authors and review editors for the AR5. Each of the selected scientists, specialists and experts was nominated in accordance with IPCC procedures, by respective national IPCC Focal-Points, by approved observer organizations, or by the Bureau.

In comparison to the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), participation from developing countries has
been increased reflecting the on-going efforts to improve regional coverage in the AR5. About 30%
of authors will come from developing countries or economies in transition. The proportion of female
experts, has significantly increased since the AR4, reaching approximately 25% of the selected
authors. More than 60% of the experts chosen are new to the IPCC process, which will bring in new
knowledge and perspectives.

Congratulations, Bill! Thank you for all you do.

Last week I had the opportunity to attend a panel talk on urban agriculture and sustainable food entitled “Secret Gardens: Powerful Plots in Surprising Places” at the NYU Fales Library. The panel covered a wide range of professions, from journalist to professor and chef to farmer. Panelists tackled the big questions of where food comes from, what constitutes a farm and, in the words of moderator and food consultant Clark Wolf, “what is really going on” in our food system in the U.S.

While all of the panelists had very interesting things to say on the topics of agriculture and food, speaker George Reis’ comments came the closest to capturing the spirit of the talk’s title. As the Supervisor of Sustainable Landscaping at NYU, Reis is responsible for all the gardens at NYU. He joked that, at first, his job doesn’t sound that impressive. NYU is a dense urban campus with little green space compared to the rolling grassy quads of many other universities.  What could he possibly do with gardens at NYU?

Reis’ answer: a great deal.

He and his team of student gardeners have planted upwards of forty native plant species in tiny individual garden plots around the NYU campus. Yet again he asked, why bother? These hyper-contained garden spaces are seemingly dwarfed by their urban surroundings: huge buildings, concrete, and cars flying by. What chance does a garden stand?

Reis’ answer: a big one.

Reis uses these native plants to connect people to their environment, contending that these small spaces can have a big impact because they have a big audience, (referring directly to the 1980 classic by William H. Whyte, The Social Life of Urban Spaces).  Reis got involved in gardening for this very reason; he saw how powerfully and viscerally people respond to native blooms while walking down New York City streets.  This inspired him to keep planting.

Reis is not alone, with gardeners and urban farmers across the city tilling New York’s urban soils. They do so for beauty, for utility and for many reasons in between. However, wherever they do, the image of green growing juxtaposed against hard concrete edges and huge buildings is enough to raise a litany of questions about our urban environment and the place of this green growth within it.

A ten by ten plot of tomatoes growing on a corner somewhere in the city may not be able to feed the neighborhood, but it can start a conversation. According to Reis, therein lies the power of these “powerful plots in surprising places.” This little bit of green is exactly the surprise that New Yorkers need to catch their attention and inspire them to think about their environment in new and different ways.