Mike_E_from_NZ
29-09-2006, 05:02 PM
http://news.independent.co.uk/environme ... 769514.ece (http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1769514.ece)
Five years ago Allens Gardens provided a spectacle of dereliction all too familiar in the underprivileged London borough of Hackney. By night it was a shooting-up gallery for drug addicts, by day a dumping ground, choking with debris and burnt-out bins.
A snip, you might think, for a property developer? Not so. Today the spot is host not only to a spruced-up children's play area but also a vegetable and fruit plot that is helping to breathe new life into the once common practice of urban food growing.
It has the look of a tranquil urban idyll. There are four beds of vegetables grown under a crop-rotation system. A line of newly planted apple trees fronts an ancient brick wall, on the other side of which a young grapevine trails. Herbs such as salad burnet and mint fit into odd corners. As a reminder that modern growing needn't mean the elimination of all other forms of life, there's a tiny pond, inhabited by frogs and newts.
Find the rest of the article at the above link
Five years ago Allens Gardens provided a spectacle of dereliction all too familiar in the underprivileged London borough of Hackney. By night it was a shooting-up gallery for drug addicts, by day a dumping ground, choking with debris and burnt-out bins.
A snip, you might think, for a property developer? Not so. Today the spot is host not only to a spruced-up children's play area but also a vegetable and fruit plot that is helping to breathe new life into the once common practice of urban food growing.
It has the look of a tranquil urban idyll. There are four beds of vegetables grown under a crop-rotation system. A line of newly planted apple trees fronts an ancient brick wall, on the other side of which a young grapevine trails. Herbs such as salad burnet and mint fit into odd corners. As a reminder that modern growing needn't mean the elimination of all other forms of life, there's a tiny pond, inhabited by frogs and newts.
Find the rest of the article at the above link