Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Drive-by Urbana Manna

Drive-by Farming
Cleveland's Cornicopia?
Detroit, Breadbasket to the World??

Cleveland could produce most of its own food if the city's residents grew crops on deserted lots, industrial rooftops and parts of occupied lots, a study finds.

Drive-by Tractor Farming

The city provides about 1.5% of its own produce, but Cleveland's deindustrialized landscape provides fresh opportunities, two researchers argue. They identify three dozen vegetables and 14 fruits suitable to the Ohio climate and propose the introduction of chicken coops and beehives.

In the least intensive scenario analyzed, which would make use of 80% of every vacant lot, Cleveland could provide from 22% to 48% of its own fruits and vegetables (depending on the farming techniques used); a quarter of its own eggs and poultry; and all the honey, the researchers estimate.

In the most intensive scenario, which would add 9% of every occupied residential lot and 62% of every commercial rooftop, the city could produce up to 100% of its fruit and vegetables and 94% of its eggs and poultry.


"Can Cities Become Self-Reliant in Food?" Sharanbir S. Grewal and Parwinder S. Grewal, Cities [WSJ]

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can see spinner wheels on tractors.

poletax

Chuck Martel said...

People sweating, getting dirt under their fingernails, and taking responsibility.

They would also find out that "Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you're a thousand miles from the corn field."

This is a good idea.

Helly said...

I've got another study forya. If cities weren't Democrat vote farms, they would be self-reliant in income, taxes, and entitlement transfers.

Then they could afford to pay real farmers, who actually know how to grow food economically.

Rodger the Real King of France said...

Democrat vote farms

precious

Esteve said...

It would never work. If they farmed all the vacant lots where would they put the migrant labor camps? You know the locals will not do the hard work required for farming.

toadold said...

An African from Zimbabwe told me about what happened to the white owned farms there when the white farms where given to Mugambe's pets. They thought it would be easy and they would get rich like the white farmers. He said the first thin a lot of them did was buy a truck. Then they slowly found out that the white farmers had been working. Getting up every day before the sun came up. Doing repair work and all the other things farming requires. He said it broke his heart in a way they went from a country that was exporting food to one that was importing food. I spent my or misspent my youth in a small town that served the oil patch, ranching and farming. From what I saw and heard I decided to stay as far away from those occupations as possible. Too dangerous, to hard, and too uncertain and way too much like work.

Juice said...

Why farm when you loot to eat for free?

Anonymous said...

Don't those academics know that all the food you want grows at Food Lion, Giant and 7-11?
The locals burned them down?
Oh.
Nevermind.
BTW, some of the best farmland around here is under Walmart, Kmart and mega-shopping center parking lots.
Lt. Col. Gen. Tailgunner dick

Anonymous said...

Co-ops and collectives? How much of a cut does the private property owner of the lot get?

That oughta turn out well...

JMcD said...

Food??.
Hahahaha
Screw the food!....How much pot can you grow there?

DougM said...

Swell ...
Cleveland was built by immigrants and sons of immigrants who escaped the drudgery of scratching a living from the soil as peasants and found their dream in a society where efficiency of industrial production combined with high-intensity farming provided them a life of relative luxury. Now, some jackasses want 'em back in a peasant role.
Say, how big a tractor can the roof of an unused industrial plant hold, anyway? Oh ... okay, everybody grab a hoe.

Anonymous said...

Subsistence farming in the USA. NOW we'll start to see what REAL poverty is.

--Sapo Mal

Post a Comment

Just type your name and post as anonymous if you don't have a Blogger profile.