by CASSIM SHEPARD, Urban Omnibus, February 1st, 2012

Image: Seeing Green
Source: www.urbanomnibus.net

It’s easy to list the reasons why we are supposed to love urban agriculture: the food it yields is fresh and local; the farming it requires is fun and social; the effect on neighborhoods is revitalizing and healthy. Critics point to its inability to replace existing production and distribution channels for produce, but what if its impact extended beyond the small farm or immediate community? What if it could solve other problems? One of New York’s greatest environmental challenges is its combined sewage overflow (CSO) problem. Our outdated sewer system is designed to collect stormwater runoff, domestic sewage, and industrial wastewater in the same pipe on its way to a sewage treatment plant. When the rain is heavy, though, volume exceeds capacity and untreated wastewater flows right into our waterways. Green infrastructure is a term that refers to a wide range of technologies and systems to improve water quality through the capture and reuse of stormwater. But the policies that incentivize green infrastructure and those that govern urban agriculture are not coordinated. In some cases, urban agriculture is actively excluded from official definitions of green infrastructure. In an effort to support farming in the city and help scale it up, Tyler Caruso and Erik Facteau set out to prove scientifically the environmental benefits of rooftop and other urban farms, in particular their ability to manage stormwater, with their research project Seeing Green. In describing this project, Caruso and Facteau touch on issues that range from the effect of scientific research on public policy, the shift towards a definition of sustainability that includes performance alongside design, and the need to layer different registers of analysis in efforts to bring about a city that is more responsive to natural systems. […]

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