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Cleveland: Old Brooklyn's Benjamin Franklin Community Garden

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In Old Brooklyn behind Benjamin Franklin school on Spring Road (near Broadview), Benjamin Franklin is one of the coolest community spaces in the city. 

 

It's pretty massive, and families can rent a plot of land for a small fee to plant a garden.  I've seen people just sit out in lawn chairs by their plots and socialize with others.

 

Marigold

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The garden has to be at least 5 acres.

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You can see the names of the folks tending to the particular plot.

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The kids from the school have a plot as well.

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The folks volunteering at the garden were a little skeptical of me until I explained why I was taking photos.

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Greenhouse.

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This was about twenty minutes before tonight's storm hit.  (Luckily I live down the street.)

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Here's the entrance to the garden.

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If you're driving, you can see the garden from Tampa Road.  You can only get in from behind BF School, though.

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Speaking of which, here's the school on Spring.  I've heard that it receives very high marks.  It's kind of crappy that it has a parking lot in front of it on the main road.

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Pumpkin scarecrow.

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...and we're back to the marigolds!

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Neat stuff. Community gardens would be a good use for a lot of vacant city land, especially where it's close to folks with limited transportation who could save money on food by growing their own. 

 

 

^ ...or get access to fresh, healthy food.  Lots of inner-city nabes don't have that luxury.

In Fort Wayne there was a guy with a van who used to make the rounds of the poor neighborhoods and senior housing complexes and sell produce. He did a pretty brisk business until his source became known; he went around the supermarkets at night and raided the dumpsters for the stuff they were pitching.

 

Good food does go to waste by being discarded because of expiration dates, but the stuff he was picking up had been out of refrigeration for several hours and in some cases wasn't safe for human consumption.

Great thread!

"You don't just walk into a bar and mix it up by calling a girl fat" - buildingcincinnati speaking about new forumers

again, great shots!  this looks to be about twice the size of Ohio City's Kentucky Gardens... does that sound right?

Gorgeous! 

Awesome!  I would love a community garden plot someday.

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