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| Carrots growing in the city? |
| By Jessica Lam |
Published
03/11/2009
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Ryersonian Print Edition , Off-campus news , Going Green
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Carrots growing in the city?
Struggling to follow your 100-mile diet?
What if the city of Toronto were to grow fruits and vegetables above Union Station’s train platform or underneath the Gardiner Expressway? What about building a greenhouse inside co-op housing or schools?
These were just some of the ideas from Ryerson architecture students who were part an exhibit called Carrot City, which proposes ways of creating urban spaces and buildings that enable the production of food in the city.
The Ryerson-led exhibit showcases projects by students and designers from around the world, and officially launch Feb. 26 at Toronto’s Design Exchange. It can be viewed at the Design Exchange until April 30.
“As we struggle to identify ways to build sustainably or build sustainable communities, food becomes a key aspect,” said Mark Gorgolewski, one of three curators for Carrot City and a architectural science professor at Ryerson. “My interest in this is thinking about the role of food in the development of sustainable issues within the community and how we can bring food closer to people in the city.”
There has been a renewed interest in locally grown food, especially in light of issues surrounding health and food security, as well as the social and environmental consequences of importing and exporting food.
Three years ago, a small group of Ryerson architecture students wanted to find out how urban design could fit in this area.
Ryerson architecture professors Joe Nasr and June Komisar noticed that a few students scattered in the program shared a common interest in cities’ food systems and the impact of agricultural issues on urban design.
“We noticed there was a whole bunch of (students) working separately. We started bringing them together and working with them,” said Nasr, a professor at Ryerson’s Centre for Studies in Food Security.
A couple years later, Ryerson organized an international symposium which presented some of undergraduate students’ theses.
The response was so positive that Gorgolewski, Nasr and Komisar decided to contact the Design Exchange to hold and curate a comprehensive exhibit.
Andy Guiry, a Ryerson architecture graduate, created a project called the Urban Agriculture Hub. In it, he shows the space beneath the Gardiner Expressway can be used to house a building that produces and sells food.
He suggests putting turbines along the highway’s median strip to generate energy.
“It was about coming up with creative solutions to dealing with the Gardiner Expressway, which is seen as a problem for the city of Toronto.
Rather than tearing it down and putting in a 12-lane surface highway, I thought, ‘Let’s see if we can think creatively about this,’” said Guiry.
Other Ryerson projects propose building community gardens in schools, greenhouses in co-op housing, and rooftop gardens on skyscrapers.
The ideas may sound far-fetched, but businesses have started to embrace some of them.
The Fairmont Hotel has recently implemented a rooftop garden, which grows herbs for the hotel restaurant to use.
Gorgolewski said while there is some interest in the ideas, what is important is talking about their impact. “There’s been less discussion on how this might actually affect the design of spaces in cities. And this is what the intention is – to start that discussion.”
The idea seems to be catching on. There have been requests to present the exhibit in Washington, London, Vancouver and Montreal.
At Ryerson, there’s a small greenhouse on the architecture building fourth floor, that grows tomatoes, aloe vera and herbs.
But there appears to be no larger plans for food production on campus, said Nasr. “It did not get considered in the Master Plan, but it should.”
For Guiry, Carrot City is important in opening up people’s avenues of thought when it comes to food, sustainability and urban living. “Our current food system is based entirely on oil . . . In the city of Toronto, if it were to have its borders shut off, the city would run out of food in three days,” said Guiry.
He hopes in the future, green issues will be embedded in every design. “It’s sort of like saying, ‘I’ve designed this building and it’s structurally sound’ .... Of course it is; it better be. (Eventually), you’re not going to have to say, ‘This is green design.’ You’re just going to say, ‘This is design.’”
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