Urban Agriculture | August 29, 2024
Evolving to Meet New Yorkers' Urban Agriculture Needs
NYRP staff leading a volunteer day in Inwood's Riley-Levin Children's Garden. Left to right: Angel Tobar, Corey Blant, Nelson Thomas, Alaina Brewer, and Quinn Van Buren. Credit: Ben Hider Dedicated New Yorkers who put in the time and effort to tend an urban garden in a concrete jungle want it to thrive; so does New York Restoration Project’s Urban Agriculture program.
Since the 2020 pandemic crisis, our Urban Agriculture (UA) team’s mission has been to assist our citywide gardener network grow to their greatest potential. This includes advising the more than 700 gardeners who are active in our 52 portfolio gardens, as well as growers affiliated with our Gardens for the City (GFTC) partners, whose spaces NYRP either built from scratch or renovated in recent years.
The program evolves every year to adapt to growers’ needs, and 2024 has welcomed exciting developments beginning with our first-ever Winter Academy for gardeners in our GFTC network. Winter Academy takes advantage of the off-season to give growers a head-start for the year with classes on a range of topics including soil health, seed-starting, and mushroom-growing.
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“Winter Academy was definitely a big goal of ours and it was a success,” says NYRP Urban Agriculture Manager Genevieve Harding. “We engaged almost 60 growers from over 30 gardens and farms throughout the city; that’s a great turnout and most people came for multiple days. It was a really great way to start the season.”
“All of the workshops NYRP has offered have been so insightful,” says GFTC partner Sade Boyewa El of Garden of Love Community Garden in Harlem. “Gardening is trial and error, so having the support of these experts who are really dedicated to supporting urban farming is priceless.”
Another important 2024 initiative has been rolling out six new drip-irrigation systems to our partners who have in-ground water systems (many New York City community gardens do not). With rising temperatures and more frequent heat waves, this work has proven crucial to many spaces throughout the city.
“The climate is getting hotter and more unpredictable,” says NYRP Urban Agriculture Director Corey Blant. “To have an irrigation system that can offset some of the challenges makes the world of difference for people and for plants. This is especially true for gardens with elders, as well as schools that go completely offline during the summer.”
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A third exciting development for the program has been activating NYRP’s Riley-Levin Children’s Garden in Inwood’s Sherman Creek Park as an educational hub for Urban Agriculture best practices. Starting in May, our UA team has held bi-weekly volunteer days for people from the community to get hands-on gardening experience and learn about topics ranging from best trellising practices, to why composting is essential, and how to treat pests. The UA staff has also collaborated with our NYRP Parks field crew to establish an adjacent edible forest garden and community mushroom farm.
“NYRP’s Urban Agriculture team has upgraded the entire experience of this garden,” says Riley-Levin gardener and WHIN Food Council member Tyreek Jackson. “In the few years that we’ve had the Urban Agriculture team here, we’ve upgraded the garden beds, installed more trellises, and developed better compost systems.”
As this season winds down, the Urban Agriculture team is already thinking ahead. One emerging priority is helping gardeners specialize their gardens according to their specific interests. “We have folks who are interested in medicinal plants, dye plants, cut flowers, and growing mushrooms,” says Corey. “Next year, we really want to hone our assistance so that gardeners can continue to make their spaces their own. Growing food is of course central to any kind of agriculture, but it’s not the only option. There are a lot of ways to practice agriculture, food production and otherwise.”
Gardeners are looking forward to this continued specialization and assistance, too. “We have developed true friendships with NYRP,” reflects Sade. “I don’t know any other organization that really offers this kind of support to gardeners in the city.”
New York Restoration Project’s Urban Agriculture program is grateful to receive generous support from: USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service; USDA Office of Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production; New York State Department of Agriculture & Markets; The Burpee Foundation; Con Edison Power of Giving; Farm Credit Northeast AgEnhancementl; The New York Community Trust; the Citizens Philanthropic Foundation; and our many foundation and corporate partners whose general operating funds support this program.
We also thank the following New York City Council Members: Amanda Farias, Althea Stevens, Oswald Feliz, Kevin Riley, Sandy Nurse, Nantasha Williams, Kamillah Hanks, Pierina Ana Sanchez, Lincoln Restler, and Shekar Krishnan.