Gotham Greens + Whole Foods = fresh

It’s official.  Whole Foods Market and New York-based rooftop farming company Gotham Greens are partnering on a high-tech greenhouse atop the supermarket chain’s forthcoming Gowanus location.  The Gothamist Daily reported that on April 1, Whole Foods announced the partnership, which will yield a 20,000 square foot (0.5 acre) hydroponic rooftop greenhouse.  The Brooklyn market will represent Whole Foods’ eighth New York City location, and the first to house a commercial rooftop greenhouse.

Gotham Green‘s courtship with Whole Foods began with the company’s 15,000 square foot (0.3 acre) flagship location in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, which has sourced fresh produce to various Whole Foods locations since 2011.  The demand for roof-fresh greens and herbs is clearly through the roof, as the two companies embark on this new chapter in their relationship.

Produce grown in the rooftop greenhouse will be available in the store below (as well as in other Whole Foods New York locations), thereby minimizing transportation costs and associated greenhouse gas emissions.  As with Gotham Greens’ flagship location, no pesticides will be used on the crops as they mature in their hydroponic haven.  The greenhouse’s year-round production will incorporate sustainable technologies that include solar generated power and a sophisticated irrigation system that uses 20 times less water than conventional ground-level row farming.

But wait, there’s more!  The Daily News reports that Gotham Greens is slated to open an even larger commercial rooftop greenhouse in Jamaica, Queens.  This 60,000 square foot (1.4 acre) behemoth – one of the largest in the country – will occupy the roof of an industrial building.  The hydroponic facility is expected to create 30 jobs and yield approximately 500 tons of produce per year, according to Gotham Greens founder and CEO, Viraj Puri.

What do you think about year-round rooftop production?  Would your neighborhood welcome one of these cutting edge farms?

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collective brain power

From August 15-18, urban agricultural enthusiasts from around the world gathered in Toronto for the very first Urban Agriculture Summit.  The international conference, hosted by Green Roofs for Healthy Cities and FoodShare, attracted over 500 farmers, activists, educators, CEOs, design professionals, developers, and other industry leaders to discuss current initiatives and explore the future of urban agriculture.

Seated tightly in a lecture hall at Toronto’s Reyerson University, we listened to the conference’s opening remarks while fidgeting in anticipation of the lectures, panel discussions, and brain mingling to come.  Topics would range from social issues (food security and community building), to the sciences (urban ecology and technology), to implementation (planning, design, financing, and policy).  An astounding assortment of industry leaders were in attendance – all the hot shots were there.  Will Allen, Founder and CEO of the Milwaukee-based agricultural organization Growing Power, kick-started the conference with an inspiring keynote address.  Brightfarms CEO Paul Lightfoot maintained the conference’s momentum with an eye-opening talk about his greenhouse hydroponic company’s innovative business model.  High-profile rooftop farmers, like Ben Flanner from Brooklyn Grange, led workshops and sat on informative panels.  Architects and landscape architects offered insight on the practicalities of designing urban agricultural spaces, and community gardeners discussed best practices for maintaining them.

The conference’s emphasis on rooftop agriculture attracted quite a crowd.  I presented on rooftop production techniques to a room of 60 or so attendees, and the rooftop buzz hummed throughout the rest of the conference.  One of the most fascinating panel discussions I attended paired rooftop row farmer Ben Flanner with Kurt D. Lynn, co-founder of the Montreal-based rooftop hydroponic greenhouse company, Lufa Farms.  The two experts discussed differences in their company’s approaches to financing, business development, production, and sales outlets.  When viewed side-by-side, the contrasting business models revealed unique opportunities and challenges, specific to each approach.  The contrast was fascinating.

After the conference, attendees returned to Cuba, Germany, India, the U.S., and other home countries, to disseminate their freshly cultivated knowledge and excitement.  I hope, as do countless others, for a second Urban Agriculture Conference in 2013.

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Microsoft reaches new heights of freshness

The technology news site GeekWire reported yesterday that Microsoft may be in the market for rooftop greenhouses at the company’s Redmond campus.  The technology giant is in preliminary talks with UrbanHarvest, a Seattle-based rooftop farming startup company, to evaluate the feasibility of rooftop farming at the corporation’s main facility.

photo by Lauren Mandel

UrbanHarvest was founded recently by University of Washington MBA candidates Chris Sheppard and Chris Bajuk.  The two won first place on Thursday at the University of Washington’s annual business plan competition, where they received $25,000 to propel UrbanHarvest into the next stages of development.  The company’s website does not yet show any built projects, which means that UrbanHarvest could jumpstart business with an extremely high profile project.

Microsoft currently imports produce from California for its cafes and cafeterias.  Growing food within the campus would minimize transportation costs and maximize freshness for cafeteria fruits and vegetables.  UrbanHarvest and Microsoft identified three buildings for evaluation: a parking garage, Building 121, and Building 122.  Bajuk estimates that the Microsoft Farm will cost approximately $1 million to build, and construction could start as early as next year.

Rooftop agriculture could add a flare of freshness to Microsoft and propel the corporation’s sustainability initiatives to new heights.

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the value of visibility

Rooftop farms and gardens are intoxicating when you’re up on the roof, but how the heck are you supposed to know they’re there from down on the ground?  Visibility is a powerful tool in spreading the word about a rooftop gem (well, maybe “emerald” is more accurate), and empowering people to start their own skyline initiative.  Visibility can be achieved through communication, such as media coverage, blogging, or word of mouth, or it can be achieved by physical means.  Here, we focus on the latter.  What simple steps can you take to ensure that your rooftop farm or garden is visible from the ground?

1|  Location location location!  When selecting the building on which you’ll build your rooftop haven, pick a busy neighborhood – the more foot traffic the better.  Some rooftop farms are visible to cyclists and motorists, but when operating a vehicle it’s best to keep one’s eyes on the road, and not in the clouds.  Pedestrians are more likely to look around while they’re in transit, and it’s safe for them to do so.

SHARE Food Program || image by Google Earth, diagram by Lauren Mandel

SHARE Food Program, in North Philadelphia, has plans to turn its warehouse roof into an active farm.  While raising the funds to do so, Bill Shick, the non-profit’s on-site farmer, won a grant to build a handful of rooftop raised beds.  Shick, with the help of the volunteers from the grant’s donor company, framed the beds two weeks ago, on the northwest corner of the 160,000 square foot (3.7 acre) roof.  Their goal?  To make the beds as visible as possible.  They selected a corner of the roof that is virtually eye-level with an adjacent bridge.  Both pedestrians, and in this case cyclists and motorists, can see the pilot project while in transit.

Pilot site next to an adjacent bridge || photo by Lauren Mandel

2| Build up, not out.  Most roofs have a low perimeter wall, known as a parapet.  When rooftop visibility is sought, you may decide to introduce vertical elements into your farm or garden design.  This may involve trellises, bean poles, sunflowers, fruit trees, or any other element that extends above the parapet.  Shick opted for bean poles in his pilot project to ensure that bridge travelers get a glimpse of green.  The poles themselves are simple: 2” x 4” pressure treated wood that extend six feet above the raised bed framing.  Each raised bed is equipped with six bean poles, which leaves plenty of real estate for climbers.

An army of bean poles extends above the parapet || photo by Lauren Mandel

Volunteers secure the 2x4s with screws || photo by Lauren Mandel

3| Advertise.  Even though your rooftop farm will be obvious to some, others will walk right by without noticing.  Get creative with street level advertising!  I recently met the founder of Walk Raleigh, a grassroots initiative focussed on promoting urban walkability through pedestrian-oriented signage.  The movement, which started as a guerrilla sign-hanging graduate thesis project, has gone viral.  With the help of a Kickstarter campaign and attention from the BBC and other media giants, Walk Raleigh has expanded to cities around the country.  Signage encouraging pedestrians to look up at your farm can take advantage of the same principles.  Draw arrows on the sidewalk with chalk; hang signs pointing up to the roof; do whatever it takes to grab people’s attention!  Just remember to keep it legal, and respect your neighbor’s property.  Hey, if you neighbors get hooked, maybe they can plant some signage too.

Street-level advertising would boost the visibility of SHARE’s pilot project (right) || photo by Lauren Mandel

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indecent exposure

As a Project Manager for the green roof firm Roofmeadow, I regularly travel around the country to perform construction oversight.  In December I had the good fortune of overseeing construction at a hotel in Lower Manhattan, which sits one block from the Hudson River.  From six stories up the view was unparalleled – and so was the wind.

During construction, the green roofs and raised bed production area experienced 50 mph winds.  A much milder microclimate could be found at the street level, but up on the roof, temperature fluctuations and extreme wind conditions reigned.

Lower Manhattan green roof construction ||  photo by Lauren Mandel

Exposure is one of the most significant obstacles to rooftop farming.  High winds cause winnowing (soil loss) and desiccation (soil drying), while temperature fluctuations can cause crops to bolt (flower) prematurely.  Each roof experiences a slightly different microclimate, but some basic rules of exposure are as follows:

1| Mind the water: Rivers and other bodies of water in cities often act as wind corridors.  Selecting a roof that is shielded from these channels can help to minimize extreme rooftop winds.

2| Stay low: Higher building stories generally experience greater wind speeds, which means that a farm will experience less stress on top of a 1-3 story building than on a taller structure.

3| Surround yourself: Take advantage of high neighboring buildings and taller segments of the farm’s own building, which can act as wind breaks. Positioning your farm directly south of a taller building wall can help to block gusts.  The wall may also capture heat, which will warm the adjacent soil. Be sure to avoid taller buildings to the south that will cast shadows on your farm.  Also keep in mind that building north of a vacant lot can be risky, because you never know if a taller building will be erected on that site.

4| Cover up: Temperature fluctuations can be minimized by covering your crop rows with shade cloth.  This thin cloth is used regularly on ground-level farms, and it benefits crops by capturing the heat that is released by the plants and soil.  Rooftop wind will fill the cloth like a sail, and so it’s best to build low hoop houses to frame the cloth.  These hoop houses should be screwed or bolted to the sides of raised beds, or ballasted by the walkways between farm rows.

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we can’t afford NOT to do this

The bottom line is that cities can’t afford not to invest in rooftop agriculture.  The societal and environmental benefits of rooftop food production far outweigh the practice’s costs, particularly when expanded across a skyline.  Without targeted policy changes and financial incentives, however, rooftop agriculture will remain unaffordable to most people.  It is through this governmental action that rooftop farms and gardens can become a reality for individuals and communities.

There are currently no commercial rooftop farms in the U.S. that support themselves exclusively through sales.  Many depend on grants or funding from external beneficiaries, as well as significant amounts of volunteer labor.  Some farms have been successful in attracting investors, which is a wise strategy for gaining startup capital.  Gotham Greens in Brooklyn, NY (gothamgreens.com) is a commercial rooftop farm worth keeping an eye on.  The 15,000 sf hydroponic greenhouse facility is headed by a savvy CEO who hopes that Gotham Greens will become the first commercially viable rooftop farm in the country.

The diagram above weighs the costs of urban rooftop agriculture (left) against the benefits (right).  The comparison ranks factors in terms of significance, where the largest text represents the most significant cost or benefit.

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book teaser

Productive rooftop farms and gardens around the globe continue to prove that rooftop agriculture is possible.  The question, though, is not of feasibility; it is of viability.  Is rooftop agriculture viable in the United States given the current environmental, economic, and cultural climates?  How can we shape our policies, architecture, and culture to foster the long-term success of rooftop agriculture, particularly at the neighborhood and city scales?

“Eat Up” will reveal how urban rooftop agriculture is feasible at varying scales, depending on what conditions are present.  Reshaping our political, architectural, and cultural conditions in an informed way can make rooftop agriculture a reality for more individuals and communities.  The book is intended not only to educate the reader as to what is possible, but also to provide a springboard for innovation.  As hopefully the first book ever published to exclusively focus on rooftop agriculture, the goal of the book is to explore the subject matter’s potential, to understand our limitations, and to breed inspiration.

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