GROW YOUNGSTOWN
A CREATIVE PROJECT
SUBMITTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL
IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS
FOR THE DEGREE
MASTER OF LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE
BY
KYLE T. BARRETT
MALCOLM CAIRNS, ADVISOR
BALL STATE UNIVERSITY
MUNCIE, INDIANA
MAY 2010
Table of Contents
Table of Contents . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
2
Table of Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
4
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
8
Project Inspiration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
9
Chapters
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
a. A New Vision . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
b. Project Scope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
c. Project Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
d. Assumptions/Delimitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
e. Moving Forward . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
2. Blast Furnaces to Food Precincts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
3. Sustainable Food System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
a. Sustainable Food System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
b. Sustainable Food City . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
c. Youngstown’s Future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
i. Production . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36
ii. Processing/Transportation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
iii. Distribution and Food Sales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
iv. Consumption and Celebration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
2
v. Waste Recovery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
vi. Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
d. Sustainable Food System Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
4. Grow Youngstown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
a. Food Precinct . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
i. Design Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
ii. Management Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
iii. Food Hub . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
iv. Satellite/Neighborhood Branches . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
b. Planning Response . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
c. Design Discussion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
i. Food Hub: Inventory and Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
ii. Transition to Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73
iii. Food Hub Concept . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
iv. Master Plan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
d. Design Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97
5. A Look into the Future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
a. Entrepreneurship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .101
b. Seek Precedence
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .102
c. Food Assessment
d. Food Policy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .104
e. Final Remarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .104
Glossary of Terms
Bibliography
3
Table of Figures
1.1 – Land use map (2004) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
1.2 – Future land use map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
1.3 – Census 2000 Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
2.1 – Republic of Steel Mills, 1939 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
2.2 – Youngstown grows with Industry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.3 – Bringing home the bacon . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.4 – Steeltown
Lockdown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
. 2.5 – Population
Chart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
. 2.6 – View entering downtown on Market St. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.7 – House near North Heights . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.8 – Downtown Parking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.9 – Federal Street Downtown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.10 – Storefront on Federal Street . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.11 – Updated housing east of downtown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.12 – Vacant land south end of downtown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.13 – Abandoned dwelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.14 – Vacant buildings on east side . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.15 – Abandoned unused railroad bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.16 – Abandoned south side business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.17 – Vacant residential lot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
4
2.18 – Vacant land use map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
3.1 – Sustainable Food System Diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
3.2 – Backyard/Kitchen Garden . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
3.3 – .Kitchen
Garden . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
3.4 – Theoretical Street Section . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
3.5 – Grape Pergola in a park . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
3.6 – .Shared
Land . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
3.7 – Growing in Small Urban Spaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
3.8 – Urban agriculture demonstration garden at City Hall, Vancouver, BC. . . . . . . 40
3.9 – Food Oasis/Food Desert diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
3.10 – Food Celebration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.11 – United States waste breakdown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.12 – Toronto Municipal Compost Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
4.1 – Food Precinct network conceptual diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
4.2 – Grow Youngstown Network . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
4.3 – Aerial photo of proposed food hub site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
4.4 – .Pedestrian
Shed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
. 4.5 - Context
diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60
. Gateways . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.6 - Site
4.7 – Wean United . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.8 – Wean United . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
4.9 – Environment beneath Market Street Bridge . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
4.10 – Site Entrances and vehicular connections . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
4.11 – Phelps Street government parking lot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4.12 – Phelps Street site entry conditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4.13 – Connection to convention center lot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
5
4.14 – Rail lines running through Building 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
4.15 – Building 1 interior . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
4.16 – Wean United Facility Diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
4.17 – Building 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
4.18 – Building 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
4.19 – Building 6 entrance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
4.20 – Overgrown land . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
4.21 – 1910 Panorama of site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
4.22 – 1907 Sanborn Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 70
4.23 – Topography Map . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
4.24 – Design Organization. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
4.25 – Site Concept Diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76
4.26 – Educational Trail Diagram
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
4.27 – Grow Youngstown Land Use Map
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80
4.28 – Grow Youngstown Master Plan
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
4.29 – Existing Conditions before Hydroponics
4.30 – Hydroponics
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
4.31 – Plaza present conditions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
4.32 – Entry plaza future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
4.33 – Government Parking Lot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
4.34 – Event Space . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
4.35 – Current view from convention center parking lot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
4.36 – Edible Entrance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
4.37 – Republic of Steel . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
4.38 - Current view toward downtown . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
4.39 – Staff worker picking hops . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
6
4.40 – Hop House . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88
4.41 – Chicken Factory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89
4.42 – Hanging Gardens . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90
4.43 – Learning Circle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
4.44 – Community Kitchen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
4.45 – Marketplace . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
4.46 – Rear Plaza - Republic of Beer
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
4.47 – Current conditions beneath bridge
4.48 – Emily Street Market . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95
.
5.1 - Community
Food Assessment Diagram . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103
7
Acknowledgments
This creative project is a stepping-stone on a journey of life long learning. The
research process has inspired interests in several subjects, some of which are branches of
food and agriculture, but many reach beyond the scope of this project.
I am grateful for my family and my friends – my companions on this discovery
trail. This project was born out from my concern for our health and personal well-being,
and the environments we live in. My education, while deeply intense and chaotic at
times, has enriched my life and filled my mind with ideas I hope to share with you all.
Thank you for your guidance and support throughout these three years - it all seemingly
passed by in blink.
I owe a great deal of gratitude to my advisors, Malcolm, Sean, and Vera, for your
sincere enthusiasm for this project and your guidance, which steered the refinement of
this project. I hope you all were able to add knowledge to your design and planning
arsenals. Also, to the faculty of the Landscape Architecture department who showed
me a different way to look at the world, and helped me realize skills I may not have
discovered without your encouragement.
Finally to my studio mates, whom I have shared this journey of synthesis
and creativity. I wish our curiosities will continue our quest for knowledge and
understanding, in an effort to become innovative leaders.
8
Project Inspiration
“It’s bizarre that the produce manager is more important to my children’s health than the
pediatrician.”1 - Meryl Streep
The driving force behind this creative project is a belief that everyone on earth is
born with the right to clean water and healthy food – essential elements of healthy lives.
Over the past few years I have developed a passion, for sustainable food and sustainable
agriculture. During studio projects and personal exploration, I have searched for a variety
of methods to integrate food into designed landscapes, while generating identifiable food
characteristics to influence food notoriety and awareness in neighborhoods, towns, and
large cities.
Michael Pollan’s (2006) book, The Omnivores Dilemma: A Natural history of
four meals,2 was the catalyst for my sustainable food systems education. His research on
industrial agriculture and American agri-business spurred many thoughts and concerns
about my health and wellness, nutrition, and sparked a curiosity about the origins of the
ingredients on my dinner plate. Pollan made me question whether the people controlling
the products (not only food) I buy have my best interest in mind; and as I began to
shape my focus and interpretation of food in America, high fructose corn syrup, largescale livestock feedlots, and corn, became common discussion topics among friends
and relatives. Inspiration led me to seek opinions and information from researchers,
academics, columnists, farmers, and film documentaries, and so on.
9
Our food system has changed more in the past 50 years than in the previous
10,000.3 Food is a multi-trillion dollar enterprise controlled by a handful of large
corporations from production to waste management.4 The lack of transparency between
us and our food system has removed the connection between us and our food origins
– at least we can never be certain how our food is grown unless we shake our farmer’s
hand. The conventional food system in the United States has depleted the taste buds of
Americans. The variety of food offered in supermarkets today lacks diversity – at least I
have noticed discrepancy in the variety of peppers I can buy at a farmers market opposed
to a supermarket. The agri-business model does not seem to provide the exploration
of heirloom varities of food, which make eating and cooking so engaging. The agribusiness model is high on capital, chemicals, and machines, and does not produce
anything that tastes good.5
The conventional food system has also increased the carbon footprint of American
dinner plates, as bites of food forked into mouths across the United States travel an
average of 1,500 miles.6 Today it takes between seven and ten calories of fossil fuel
energy to deliver one calorie of food energy to an American plate.7 However, the system
has created a supply sufficient to meet the demand of American citizens, along with the
desire for inexpensive products.
“Inexpensive food has become the norm. In North America approximately
11% of disposable income is spent on food compared to + 20 % in Europe.
Increasingly however, we recognize this has exacted other less obvious
costs such as environmental degradation, loss of bio-diversity, loss of
farms, farmland and farmers, and exploitation of labor and resources,
as well as compromised health and nutrition, food safety and security.
Thus the destructive ecological, social and economic consequences
and limitations of the modern global agri-food system are becoming
10
increasingly evident and problematic.”8
It seems unlikely that people, cities, and private food retailers, will be able
to operate on local food alone. A supermarket manager is not going to stop stocking
bananas because they travel thousands of miles from Ecuador – and nor should they.
Bananas are quite popular in America, so unless we begin to grow food indoors as
witnessed in parts of the world, we will continue to ship our food from remote areas of
Earth providing us with the diverse delicacies and taste palettes.
These comments are only my perception of the shortcomings of the conventional
food system, but regardless of how generic food is, we are privileged people to be able
to experience a variety of foods from around the globe. There are nutritional needs and
tastes imports offer that may not be available locally: avocados, citrus fruits, grains,
or livestock. People enjoy these foods and need their nutritional value; but lets urge
local food systems to support these needs before providing jet-lagging options. Finally,
planners, designers, and city officials have an opportunity to influence decision-making
and policies to promote local food production and distribution – establishing a sustainable
food system locally, which has the potential to influence economic growth and viable
cities and regions. 9
11
Endnotes
1
Food Lion, http://www.andywardrep.com/FoodLion(AndyWardrep).pdf, (Retrieved May 4, 2009).
2
Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s Dilemma: a natural history of four meals,
(New York: Penguin Group, Inc., 2006).
3
Food Inc., motion picture, directed by Robert Kenner (2008; Robert Kenner Studio, Magnolia Pictures).
4
Olga Bonfiglio, “Delicious in Detriot,” Planning, August/September 2009, 37.
5
Dan Barber, “How I fell in love with a fish,” TedTalks, 2010.
6
Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture,
“Issues in a nutshell: How far does your food travel to get to your plate?” http://
www.cuesa.org/sustainable_ag/issues/foodtravel.php, (2006).
7
Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, 183.
8
Kent Mullinix, et. al, “Agricultural Urbanism and Municipal Supported
Agriculture: A New Food System Path for Sustainable Cities,”
(Kwantlen Polytechnic University: Surrey,BC, August 30, 2008), 5.
9
Bonfiglio, “Delicious in Detriot,” 37.
12
Project Introduction
Youngstown, Ohio, has been faced with a phenomenon of a shrinking population
since the 1960s. The city now faces and abundance of vacant homes and neighborhood
lots, dilapidated industrial sites, and an overall lack of community identity. In 2005, the
City of Youngstown produced the Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan, which outlined the
plans for Youngstown’s future as a smaller city - downsizing. A main goal for the plan
was to green the city, and discover several methods to attain it. However, the plan did not
recognize agriculture as a green revitalization method.
This creative project will introduce and outline the methods necessary to become
a sustainable food city. The planning and design of a food precinct presents Youngstown
an alternative greening method that will revitalize the city with food and agriculture,
while using food to instill a new city identity. This proposal will encourage Youngstown
to embark on a quest toward becoming a sustainable food city, and will act as a model for
cities in similar predicaments.
A New Vision
The Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan is a fresh new 21st Century vision for
Youngstown addressing the city’s status as a small city. The plan estimates a population
stability around 80,000 residents, but other projections indicate Youngstown’s population
falling to 54,000 by 2030.1 The plan states a desire to focus on new industries to define
the regional economy. It plans for new land uses and initiatives to revitalize the city, and
13
address its vast amount of vacant land through green initiatives, including remediating
industrial lands, adding greenspace, parkland, and open space. The Youngstown 2010
Citywide Plan does not acknowledge agriculture as a green opportunity. In fact, the
future land use plan decreases the amount of agricultural land use as shown in the
comparison of land use maps in Figures 1.1 and 1.2.
Figure 1.1 - Land Use Map - hightlights current agricultural land use in Youngstown - Source: Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan
Youngstown shares its predicament with other industrial cities, such as Detroit.
Deindustrialization bombarded both cities, as they were left with ruptured economies,
high unemployment, and vacant land – only the scale of the effects of deindustrialization
differentiates the relationship between Youngstown and Detroit. The Motor City is
looking at 70,000 vacant lots, both industrial and residential, which equals to about 27
percent of the city’s 139 square miles.2 Based on Census 2000 data, shown in Figure 1.3,
14
Tod Children's HospitalStambaugh Golf Course
Forum Health North
Norman Johnson Park
Anshe Emeth Cemetery
Tod Homestead Cemetery
North Side Swimming Pool
nHarding Ellis Playground
Harding Elementary Rayen Middle
Mt. Hope Cemetery
Crandall Park
John White Park
West End Park
St. Elizabeth'sWick Park
St. Peter & Paul Cemetery
North Elementary P. Ross Berry Middle
n
Kochis Park
Ursuline
Victory Field
MVSD Playground
Borts Pool & Field
East High
Spring Common
Choffin Career Center
St. Michael Cemetery
Calvary Cemetery
Huxley Park
nMary Haddow Elementary
Oak Hill Cemetery
Oakhill Renaissance Place
Schenley Park
nWest Elementary
Jackson Cemetery
Lincoln Park/Oakland Field
Chaney High
Hillman Park
Oak-Ken Playground
n
Williamson Elementary
Gibson Field
Eagle Heights
Sports Complex
City of Youngstown, Ohio
Future Land Use
N. Kennedy Alcoholic Clinic
Volney Rogers Middle
Cardinal MooneyHomestead Park
Kirkmere Parkn
Legend
Municipal Boundary
Wilson Middle
Fosterville Park
Taft Elementary
nTaft Park
Kirkmere Elementary
Sheridan Park Barrett Playground
Pemberton/Donnell Park
Ipe Field
µ
0
0.25 0.5
1
Buckeye Plat Field
e
b
∆
a
∆
Ò
µ
≤
n
n
n
Æ
v
c
∆
Airport
Cemetery
City Park
Correctional Facility
Fire Station
Multi-Family Residential
Business CBD
Future High School
Hospital Facility
Industrial Light
Hubbard Arterial
Industrial Heavy
Prepared by: The Center for
Urban and Regional Studies
Youngstown State University
Source: Mahoning County
Enterprise GIS Files,
Youngstown 2010
1.5.05
Lynn Playground
P C Bunn Elementary
n
Institutional
Transportation/Utilities
U.S. Highway
Recreation/Open Space
State Highway
Agriculture
Extension of Hillman St.
Bancroft Park
Business
Industrial 'Green'
Library
Limited Access Highway
Youngstown Christian
Mill Creek Park
Single, Two and Three Family Residential
Future Elementary School
Future Middle School
Highway Ramp
1.5
Miles
Lake or River
Stream
Amtrak Station
WRTA Station
Park Road
Future Planned Residential
Priority Business
Cemetery Road
Smoky Hollow Planned Residential
Railroad
YMHA Hope VI Planned Residential
Mahoning River Riparian Zone
Mahoning River Corridor of Opportunity
Crab Creek Corridor
Figure 1.2 - Future Land Use Map - reveals decrease of agricultural land. Source: Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan
unemployment in Youngstown was 11.3% and 20.4% of the population was living below
the poverty level, revealing the impact industry collapse had on these cities.
With the help of non-profit organizations and active community members, Detroit
is turning its dilapidated land into productive land through an urban garden movement.
Many community groups and small organizations merged to form the Garden Resource
Program Collaborative, which has helped establish 359 family, 170 community, and 40
school gardens throughout Detroit since 2003,3 within the 900 urban gardens of the nonprofit Detroit Agriculture Network.4 The collaborative has helped redevelop and stabilize
neighborhoods as many gardens are connected to youth and community engagement
programs.
15
16
Figure 1.3 - Census 2000 Data - Importatnt data are education level and household income, which encourage the introduction of low income-jobs.
The economic initiatives of local and state government are pushing the
development of urban agriculture, as they have recognized the economic opportunity
connected to urban agriculture. In 2008, the Michigan state government established
the Garden for Growth Program, which provided residents opportunities to lease vacant
land for fifty-dollars to implement a garden.5 While many non-profit organizations are
involved in the Detroit gardens movement, John Hantz, a wealthy money manager with
a net worth over 100-million dollars, has identified a food and agriculture market in
Detroit, and has committed to building an urban farm expanding over 50 acres of East
Detroit’s landscape.6
“Hantz thinks farming could do his city a lot of good: restore big chunks
of tax-delinquent, resource-draining urban blight to pastoral productivity;
provide decent jobs with benefits; supply local markets and restaurants
with fresh produce; attract tourists from all over the world; and -- most
important of all -- stimulate development around the edges as the local
land market tilts from stultifying abundance to something more like
scarcity and investors move in.”7
Hantz’s principles of profiting from urban agriculture have some community gardeners
concerned of corporate takeover of their grassroots campaign for Detroit’s urban
agriculture network. In the end however, Hantz strongly believes someone should pay
taxes, and that a “land grab” won’t sufficiently restore Detroit’s economy. Hantz Farms
will support the economy’s revitalization through farming for profit.8
Another project serving as a model is Toronto’s, The Stop Community Food
Centre. It is representative of a food precinct and focuses on sustainable food initiatives.
The non-profit organization, which started as a food bank thirty years ago,9 carries out
its mission “to increase access to healthy food in a manner that maintains dignity, builds
17
community and challenges inequality,”10 through a diverse program including community
kitchens, cooking classes, drop-in meals, a food bank, outdoor bake ovens, food markets,
community advocacy.11 The Stop maintains 18,000 square feet of production area,
which yields 4,000 pounds of fresh organic produce annually.12 The 10,000 square
foot production area includes a year-round greenhouse at the Green Barn, in addition
to a community kitchen and classrooms for food education for adults and youth.13 The
Green Barn also has a compost demonstration project to inform the community of the
importance for waste recovery, recycling food and organic waste, and the potential to
create organic fertilizer.
It is worth emphasizing The Stop’s commitment to sustainable food systems
education, and its commitment to educational activities for adults and youth: cooking
workshops, planning/growing workshops, food tastings, and market events. This
document will later reveal how education is the backbone of a sustainable food system,
ensuring an understanding to why The Stop’s programming heavily revolves around food
education and community food advocacy.
The concept and program of The Stop Community Food Centre and the on-theground food production initiatives in Detroit provide two strong examples to combine
into new vision for Youngstown, Ohio. The movement in Detroit is being mimicked in
other cities: Boston, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, New York, Portland,
San Francisco, and Washington, D.C.14 The Stop is a type of organization with the
potential to encourage food related business and food advocacy throughout cities. The
strong support for the implementation of urban agriculture on vacant land provides
evidence this industry is viable and growing; and along with a community food center,
supports the opportunity for future food development and food planning to revitalize
Youngstown, Ohio.
18
Project Scope
The Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan’s lack of acknowledgement of food and
agriculture as a viable revitalization and greening approach provides an opportunity
for this project introduce several food planning principles and design approaches
Youngstown can use in an effort to become a sustainable food city. The main focus is
to present a framework for establishing policy and planning initiatives to promote the
vitality and implementation to support local food growth and urban agriculture.
Urban agriculture initiatives take on many forms and are influenced by their
ephemeral appearance and people-centered focus.15 This project will introduce the design
concept of a food precinct, a place influenced by the elements of a sustainable food
system - a vibrant food center with a marketplace where, food growth, food processing,
food storage, food festivals, and food education would be a central focus for adults and
youth alike. The enthusiasm of the people involved in implementing this project, and the
diversity of people this project would effect, will drive this project’s success.
This project is named after Grow Youngstown, a local organization supporting
local agriculture in Youngstown. Its will and support for a sustainable local food system
will further empower its members to realize the potential of Youngstown becoming a
sustainable food city. Grow Youngstown,
“envisions Youngstown as a model for food security that employs urban agriculture, waste reduction, and resource re-use. Food security is defined
as giving populations both economic and physical access to a supply of
food, sufficient in both quality and quantity, at all times, to all social levels
and incomes.”16
With the leadership of Grow Youngstown, the city will be a center of local and direct
19
markets, small plot agricultural production and processing, and meaningful work
opportunities. “This return to our agricultural heritage as a means of strengthening our
health and economic security will create opportunities for people of many generations,
organizations, and cultures to build relationships and care for the environment.”17
This project will produce a vision to repurpose former industrial land into a
vibrant downtown community food center, and present a conceptual plan for a network
of food precincts. Food projects have the power to bring people together and stimulate
community, while connecting people with their environment.18 Food will alleviate many
of the problems facing Youngstown, Ohio, by reactivating vacant land, creating economic
drivers inspiring a new regional economy full of food related jobs, promoting food
education, and encouraging Youngstown to discover its food security and a new identity
as a sustainable food city.
Project Goals
• Create a citywide framework introducing steps Youngstown can take to integrate
food and agriculture within the fabric of the city
o Present potential places for food growth
o Create conceptual food models for:
 House lots
 Blocks
 Neighborhoods
 Streetscapes
• Plan and Design a food precinct
o Locate food hub & satellite/neighborhood precincts
o Site Design of Food Hub
 Instill the elements of the food system diagram
20
 Present creative methods to design with food/plant material
Assumptions
In order for this project to take place certain assumptions must be made to enable this
project to occur:
• The local government, city officials, and Youngstown residents accept the vision
of this proposal and the suggested impact food will have on the city’s future.
• This project will operate under the indication noted by several sources that urban
agriculture is a successful environmentally sensitive design solution, which
establishes community and economic growth.
• Laws will allow liabilities for project implementation.
• All land rights and ownership will be settled.
• Any brownfield sites being considered for agriculture plots will be remediated by
the city or the developer of the food precinct.
• All agricultural practices proposed by this report are organic.
Delimitations
In order for this project to take place, certain limits must be set:
• The project focuses on a framework and planning initiatives for the city
to implement to promote a sustainable food system. Therefore, the Grow
Youngstown food hub design will be conceptual in nature in order to present
the possibilities and potentials of the proposed site. The designer acknowledges
several opportunities and solutions could be proposed, but the design process
and multiple levels of schematic discovery are secondary to the big picture for
21
Youngstown and its food future.
• Research will not concentrate on physical food growing practices in order to focus
on the opportunities for food to mitigate the factors of shrinking city.
• This project will mention and discuss certain soil remediation practices, but will
not analyze their scientific processes or dictate the most suitable approach for
Grow Youngstown.
• The project will not discuss cost variance between mass-produced food and
organic food consumers face when shopping for food.
• Research will not calculate the ecological footprint, carbon savings, or money
saved related to a sustainable food system.
• The project suggests entrepreneurial opportunities for Grow Youngstown, but will
not specify, management structures or business models for farmers or community
organizations to operate Grow Youngstown.
• Project will not deliver a plant schedule or discuss processes undertaken to plant
or specify crops.
Moving Forward
The scope of the project has been set and the time has come for Youngstown to
realize the potential for food to influence its future. The remainder of the project will
present a framework designed to provide impetus to change the way cities think about
food and the potential food has to change the lives of citizens. Urban food production has
been identified for its beneficial impacts on people’s quality of life,19 and ability to create
a sense of local distinction, no matter how ordinary is unique and has value.20 This notion
22
suggests this project design has the potential to significantly change the individual lives
of Youngstown citizens.
23
ENDNOTES
1
City of Youngstown, Ohio, Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan, 2005, 7.
2
Olga Bonfiglio, “Delicious in Detroit,” Planning, American Planning Association, August/September 2009, 75, 9, 33.
3
Bonfiglio, Planning, 34.
4
David Whitford, “Farming: One way to try and save Detroit,” Fortune, January, 18, 2010, 161, 1, 83.
5
Bonfiglio, Planning, 37.
6
Whitford, Fortune, 79.
7
Ibid.
8
Whitford, Fortune, 83.
9
The Stop Community Food Centre, http://www.thestop.org/faq, retrieved February 10, 2010.
10
The Stop Community Food Centre, http://www.thestop.org/misson, retrieved February 10, 2010.
11
The Stop Community Food Centre, http://www.thestop.org, retrieved February 10, 2010.
12
The Stop Community Food Centre, http://www.thestop.org/community-gardens, retrieved February 10, 2010.
13
The Stop Community Food Centre, http://www.thestop.org/green-barn, retrieved February 10, 2010.
14
Bonfiglio, Planning, 37.
15
Andre Viljoen, ed., Continuous Productive Urban Landscapes, Architectural Press: Oxford, UK, 2005, 220.
16
World Health Organization, Food and Health in Europe: A New basis for action, Who Regional Publications, European Series 96, 155.
17
Grow Youngstown, http://www.growyoungstown.org/index.html, 2006.
18
Viljoen, CPULs, 220.
24
19
Viljoen, CPULs, 57.
20
Tara Garnett, Growing Food in Cities, National Food Alliance, London, 1996.
25
Blast Furnaces to Food Precincts
An understanding of Youngstown’s history
For over a century, the skyline of Youngstown, Ohio, was dominated by soot
emitting smoke stacks. The discovery of coal in 1844, lit the torch for industrialization,1
and Youngstown began its growth toward being the third largest steel producer in
the United States by the early 1900s.2 Beginning in 1846, eleven blast furnaces
were built, along with their ensuing distinction of the vernacular landscape along
the Mahoning River. Coal, iron ore, wood, and the Mahoning River distinguished
much of Youngstown’s history,3 as the consumption of natural resources impacted the
development of next century.
By the end of the 19th Century several companies including, Brier Hill Steel
Company, Republic Steel Corporation, Youngstown Sheet and Tube, and Carnegie
Steel (became U.S. Steel Corporation in 1901),
had active steel mills or planned to build mills in
the Youngstown area. These initiatives solidified
steel production as the region’s identifying element,
cultural connection between people, and the main
economic driver. By 1918, Youngstown was second
Figure 2.1 - Republic of Steel Mills, 1939
Source: Steel Town U.S.A.
to Pittsburgh as the largest steel-producing areas in the United States.4
Despite the constant filth and poor environmental quality, smoke and soot on
the horizon and on dusty windowpanes reminded people of ongoing production and
revenue flow.5 The steel industry was Youngstown’s identity, and the unifying element
26
between neighbors.6 People, families, and businesses were directly linked to the success
of the steel industry – a mill worker – a baker who sold workers pastries and coffee
each morning – a banker who deposited and cashed checks of workers paid by the steel
companies.
By 1930, Youngstown grew to a population of
170,000 as people emigrated from around the world
for their piece of the ample supply of employment.
Thousands of workers, including a growing influx
of Eastern European immigrants,7 flocked to
Youngstown and gave steel companies the physical
Figure 2.2 - Youngstown grows with Industry
Source: Steel Town U.S.A.
labor to manufacture products around the clock. In 1920, more than 25 percent of
Youngstown’s population was foreign-born, one of the highest such percentages in the
United States.8 The mills and steelworkers brought pride and definition to the community
– hard workers. However, despite strong community ties to local industry, work could
not sew the rifts of cultural and racial tension between the rich and poor, and the blacks,
the whites and foreign immigrants. The result led to riots and fighting, and steelworker
strikes for better pay, better working conditions, and better treatment from wealthy
mills owners. People came together at work, but often lived apart, causing more ethnic
breakdown – Europeans here, African Americans there, the poor on this side of town, and
wealthy further away from the smoke and soot.
Youngstown flourished from the success of the steel
industry throughout the better half of the twentieth century
(1900-1960) – tagged “Steel Town U.S.A.”9 The city enjoyed
one of the highest family income rates in the region.10 In 1929,
the city relished a high percentage (48%) of homeownership.11
Downtown businesses felt the flow of revenue from the steel
Figure 2.3 - “Bringing home the
Bacon” Source: Youngstown
Vindicator, Sept 4. 1927
27
companies. People filled the downtown area, enjoying movie theaters, art museums,
department stores, and restaurants. 12 The future looked promising for the vibrant city.
The Great Depression hit Youngstown in 1931. It was one American industrial
city hit the hardest – the unemployment rate was 23.1 percent, second only to Denver.13
The city was able to hold onto its steady population, and got out of the depression with
the demand of steel production rising for the support of World War II. Over the course
of mid-20th Century steel mills and labor unions would battle each other over wages and
quality working conditions. Workers frequently went on strike and would riot for their
rights.14 This time period also witnessed the beginning of the decline of Youngstown’s
population. The 1940s, and 1960s, in America was the beginning of the suburban
migration, which left much of Youngstown with its immigrant population, as many whites
with their higher paying jobs moved to suburban settings, expanding the metropolitan
region.15 The suburban migration began to segregate Youngstown neighborhoods and
began creating racial lines, which increased tension at work and on Youngstown’s streets
with increasing violence.
The final blow in Youngstown’s catastrophic fall from industrial dominance came
on September 19, 1977: “Black Monday.”16 Youngstown Steel and Tube announced the
closing of one its major mills. Over the next five years, Republic Steel and U.S. Steel
followed suit and closed their steel mills. An estimated 50,000 jobs were lost. The
working class of Youngstown lost approximately $1.3 billion in wages.17 Following the
loss of jobs, people soon fled the region. The exodus of the steel industry led to rapid
decline of Youngstown’s economy, landscape, and its identity.
The collapse of the steel industry left Youngstown without a plan or a vision to
deal with the consequences. The city had been operating on a comprehensive citywide
plan (1951, 1974 update) inspired by potential growth and development.18 Youngstown
28
operated on its 1974 comprehensive plan and watched the city fall into disorder. Remnants of deindustrialization littered the Youngstown landscape: empty mills,
unused railroads, vacant buildings, vacant residential lots, and abandoned housing. There
was a consistent decline in population, and a steady increase in crime. Moreover, the city
was left with a dilapidated economy and no plan to regenerate or transform its misfortune
to stabilize its local assets and population. People left to find a new life elsewhere, and
left Youngstown to fend for itself and to hang onto its memory of the past, while it tried
to discover a new identity.
“Youngstown clearly has a problem with memory. While the history of
work and community here represents important events in the development
of unions and responses to deindustrialization, people here have not
learned how to remember the past as at once meaningful and painful, a
source of pride and a tool for understanding community problems, the
basis for identity, and the starting place for building a new identity.”19
During this struggle the city
has been recognized for its battle
with violence. Following a 1963,
news article on local mob violence,
Youngstown lost its prominent Steel
Town USA title, and became “Crime
Town, USA.”20 “Few, if any, cities
have experienced the highs of being one
Figure 2.4 - Steeltown Lockdown - article focused on rising crime
rates in Youngstown. Source: Steel Town U.S.A.
of the largest steel producing city in the United States at one time with census data
showing its highest per capita family income locally (adjusted for inflation) in 1960, to
losing 40,000 manufacturing jobs overnight and garnering national attention for crime
and corruption.”21 During the 1990s, Youngstown built four prisons and became the
29
unofficial ‘prison capital’ of Ohio. This presents a distinct need to create a new face for
Youngstown and to establish a positive element for citizens to identify with, as steel once
did decades ago.
The population decline continued into the 1990s, and early 2000s. The once
vibrant steel city has witnessed its population decline of nearly 16% each of the last
four decades, as shown in figure 2.5. Youngstown did not support the housing boom in
the late 20th Century. The departing population did not encourage development, as each
new dwelling equaled a vacancy somewhere else in the city.22 Therefore, city is dealing
with an extraordinary amount of vacancies (see vacant land use map of Figure 2.18)
in the form of residential, commercial, and industrial land uses, which has created to
different faces of the community. First, is the face of a well-kept public facade trying to
maintain the image of the city. Second, is the face of deindustrialization and its remnants
of disinvestment and abandonment, which Youngstown is trying to relieve. A graphic
comparison of these conditions is represented in the images in figures 2.6 - 2.17, on page
32.
Figure 2.5 - Population chart - Youngstown endured a 16% average loss of
population over four decades. Source: Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan
30
The Two Faces of Youngstown, Ohio
Maintaining an Image
Products of Deindustrialization
Figure 2.6 - View entering downtown on Market St.
Figure 2.12 - Vacant land south end of downtown.
Figure 2.7 - House near North Heights
Figure 2.8 - Downtown Parking
Figure 2.9 - Federal Street Downtown
Figure 2.10 - Storefront on Federal Street
Figure 2.11 - Updated housing east of Downtown
Figure 2.13 - Abandoned dwelling
Figure 2.14 - Vacant buildings on east side
Figure 2.15 - Abandonned unused railroad bridge
Figure 2.16 - Abandoned business on southside
Figure 2.17 - Vacant residential lot
31
Stambaugh Golf Course
Norman Johnson Park
Anshe Emeth Cemetery
Tod Homestead Cemetery N.S. Pool
Harding Ellis Playground
Mt. Hope Cemetery
Tod Park
Crandall Park
MacDonnell Playground
Mackey Fowler Property
Children's Park Property
West End Park
Evans Field
John White Park
Truscon Playground Property
Wick Park
Sts. Peter & Paul Cemetery
John Chase Park
Kochis Park
MVSD Playground
Oak Park Property
Borts Pool & Field
Victory Field
Spring Common
St. Michael Cemetery
Huxley Park
Calvary Cemetery
Oak Hill Cemetery
Schenley Park
Jackson Cemetery
Lincoln Park/Oakland Field
Hillman Park
Stambaugh Field
Oak-Ken Playground
South Side Park
Gibson Field
City of Youngstown, Ohio Vacant Land
Sports Complex
Legend
Homestead Park
Municipal Boundary
Fosterville Park
711 Connector
Limited Access Highway
Highway Ramp
Taft Park
Kirkmere Park
Sheridan Park
Barrett Playground
U.S. Highway
Pemberton/Donnell Park
Ipe Field
Buckeye Plat Field
State Highway
Railroad
Lake or River
µ
0
0.25 0.5
1
Stream
Cemetery
Bancroft Park
1.5
Miles
Prepared by: The Center for
Urban and Regional Studies
Youngstown State University
Source: Mahoning County
Enterprise GIS Files,
Youngstown Parcel Survey
1.19.05
Lynn Playground
City Park
Mill Creek Park
Vacant Parcel
Figure 2.18 - Vacant Land Use Map - Source: Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan
Preparing for Food Planning
Youngstown’s history presents an understanding of its current situation, especially
its difficulty maintaining its population, its jobs, and its identity. Reactivating vacant
land and making it a producatve and viable part of the community will help Youngstown
reshape the future of its economy, and its identity and overall character. The remainder
of this report will present a planning and design framework intended for Youngstown and
cities in similar situations to reshape their futures by focusing on becoming a sustainable
food city.
32
Endnotes
1
Sherry Lee Linkon and John Russo, Steeltown U.S.A.: work and memory in
Youngstown, University Press of Kansas, 2002, 18.
2
City of Youngstown, Ohio, Youngstown 2010 Citywide Plan, 2005, 7.
3
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 19.
4
Steven High, Industrial Sunset: The Making of North Americas Rust Belt, 1969-
1984, University of Toronto Press, 44.
5
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 76.
6
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 69.
7
Ibid.
8
Ibid.
9
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 69.
10
City of Youngstown, Ohio, Youngstown 2010, 15.
11
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 38.
12
Ibid.
13
Ibid.
14
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 40.
15
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 41.
16
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 48.
17
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 47.
18
City of Youngstown, Youngstown 2010, 14.
19
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 245.
20
Linkon and Russo, Steeltown U.S.A., 191.
21
City of Youngstown, Youngstown 2010, 15.
22
City of Youngstown, Youngstown 2010, 31.
33
SUSTAINABLE FOOD SYSTEM
A breakdown and adaptation for Youngstown,Ohio
A sustainable food system is a symbiotic relationship between food, land, and
people, and the efficiency and sustainability of the systems making food consumption
possible. The elements of a food system that establish initiatives are listed below. This
list is a glance at the many adaptations Youngstown will consider when evaluating its
sustainable food system. This is not a binding set of rules, rather guidelines or long-term
goals set forth to improve the city’s food security, food sovereignty, and a identity of the
community.
A sustainable food system: 1
• Is energy and fuel-efficient.
• Is a powerful economic generator for farmers, whole communities and regions
• Celebrates cultural diversity in food.
• Uses efficient infrastructure for water, energy, and waste.
• Balances food imports with local capacity.
• Adopts climatically appropriate agricultural practices and crop choices.
• Works towards organic farming and preserves biodiversity in agro-ecosystems.
• Recycles nutrients recycles of organic waste into fertile soil.
• Maximizes urban agriculture and protects peri-urban (urban edge) and rural
farmland.
• Ensures that local food processing facilities are available to independent farmers
and processors.
• Sees food as an experience where people are connected to each other and the land
34
from which their food was grown.
• Has a strong educational focus to create awareness of food issues and to build
skill around food growing, processing, and preparation.
• Maximizes the economic, social and environmental performance and value of the
food sector at the regional scale
Figure 3.1 - Sustainable Food System Diagram - Source: HB Lanarc
The sustainable food system diagram (figure 3.1) presents the relationship of each
food system element and how they rely on one another. The elements presented in the
diagram, in combination with the education of people, allow the food system to operate
harmoniously.
Creation of a sustainable regional food system requires the participation of
government, community organizations, planners, developers, landscape architects, foodoriented business, and academics.2 Moreover, planners and designers will be integral
players in the development of sustainable food systems. Their expertise in land planning
and community development will engage and educate the public on the importance of
living locally and the prominent role food will play in a city’s prosperity. Professionals
will contribute to sustainable regional food systems, creating vibrant livable spaces that
35
integrate food into the community fabric, property development, and public spaces.
Sustainable Food City3
A sustainable food city exercises practices engaging the sustainable food system
elements. A sustainable food city will also integrate food into the urban environment,
creating physical access to food through pedestrian market access to residents, along with
education opportunities to impart knowledge of the food system elements. It is important
for cities to analyze its efficacy within each element of the food system to properly plan
for development to tighten sustainable food system. In a sustainable food city, people
have a personal connection with food and it is celebrated through it availability in corner
stores, restaurants, festivals, and urban/peri-urban agriculture.
Youngstown’s Future - Adapting to sustainable food system principles
Studies by HB Lanarc, de la Salle, and Barrett outline steps a city must take to
become a sustainable food city. The following section adopts these steps and outlines a
framework Youngstown can adopt toward becoming a sustainable food city.
Production
Youngstown will change the face of its landscape by incorporating a hierarchy of
edible plant material – distinctly communicating its effort to become a city focused
on food growth and on the food security of its citizens. The following typology and
definitions infer places and the variety of existing scales at which food can be produced.
• Fields – like traditional agriculture, row crops, wheat grasses can be grown in
massive plots of land and harvested mechanically – Northeast Youngstown had
agricultural land use areas pre-Youngstown 2010. Youngstown should consider
maintaining active agriculture land.
36
• Orchards & Vineyards– Any fruit-bearing tree with access to full sunlight will
deliver food. Many varieties of apple, persimmon, pear, and cherry trees, along
with walnuts and chestnuts, are suitable to grow
in the Northeast Ohio climate.
• Yards – the front and backyard can have an
impact on residents’ kitchens if they choose to
dig up their yards and build an edible landscape
– a food oasis that will support their daily needs.
Figure 3.2 - Backyard/Kitchen Garden
Tomatoes, kale, lettuce, carrots, potatoes, corn,
squash, peppers, and beets, are commonly found in
edible (kitchen) gardens – and if local laws enable
people to keep chickens, home growers will benefit
from eggs and fecal fertilizer for crops. Homes
Figure 3.3 - Kitchen Garden - due to lack
of open space residents can utilize their
backyards for food growth
tight on space may opt to build a kitchen garden in
their back yards, such as in Figures 3.2 and 3.3.
• Streets – A hierarchy of edible plant material will set a sustainable food city
apart from others. Pedestrian oriented streets lined with fruit trees and planting
Figure 3.4 - Theoretical street section presents a hierarchy of edible plant material and multi-modal transportation.
37
beds with tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, and berries, will highlight and display
Youngstown’s commitment to the local food system. Streets will incorporate
stormwater management principles where applicable, collecting water for
irrigation practices. Streets should also provide interpretive signage to food
precincts and other public areas where food is apart of an interactive landscape.
These principles may not be considered on every street in the Youngstown, but
perhaps the main arteries leading to and from food precincts will establish a sense
of place as streets focus on food and agriculture.
• Parks and Plazas – Will carry similar characteristics of
streets, but do not have to solely consist of edible plant
material. The unique character of parks and plazas
typically consist of large canopy trees, but a shift to
fruit and nut trees for new plantings will activate food
Figure 3.5: Grape Pergola in a park
Source: HB Lanarc
productivity in parks. Edible plant material should be combined with traditional
herbaceous plant material in planting beds. Educational signage accompanying
edible plant material, will allow the public to interpret and further investigate the
city’s commitment to food growth. The signs should even teach and promote
people to pick the produce off the plant when ripe!
• Shared land – Neighbors sharing space between
residential lots or vacant neighborhood areas
can build community gardens. If enough space
exist residents may be able to build a small
neighborhood farm. These areas provide a
common space for people to grow food and
Figure 3.6 - Shared Land can be
transformed into a community garden or
even a small neighborhood farm
develop community ties.
38
• Vacant land – The opportunities for vacant land to thrive as a growing medium
and rehabilitating an area are endless. Vacant land can be transformed into
productive land, and provides people with food, turns brownfields into green
space, and potentially reactivates untaxable land if the productive land is turned
into profit. Vacant land may need soil remediation, or protective membranes to
protect roots from contamination. Phyto-remediation presents and opportunity
to create bio-fuels upon the harvesting of plant material, prior to implementing
agriculture. If remediation is not possible, food growth may not be an option.
However, wood harvesting, establishing orchards and forests to produce trees,
can supplement a need for wood to produce energy, paper, and timber, and does
not require soil remediation. Vacant buildings and structures could be explored
for potential indoor/hydroponic growing – think of an oversized greenhouse –
retrofitted glass roofs and indoor irrigation, which is rising innovation to bring
more production opportunities to the urban environment.
• Raised Beds – Boxed planting beds specifically focused on food production.
Their size varies, but commonly wide enough for the users with the shortest
reach to be able to access the middle of the bed. Raised beds are diverse in that
they can exist in various environments. They are excellent answers to sites with
contaminated soil.
• Walls, Fences, Pergolas, and Trellises –Walls and fences
shape space, provide barriers and protection, and also
the opportunities for vines to grow. Technology exists
where plant trays can be installed in walls, which opens
the opportunity for strawberries, lettuce, and other shallow
rooted plants to explore new lives on vertical planes.
Figure 3.7 - Growing in Small
Urban Spaces
39
• Alleys and Balconies – Pots, planter boxes, raised beds, and many of the
characteristics of walls and fences can be fused into allies and balconies.
Restaurants could potential utilize allies to harvest salad mixes from raised beds.
• Food Precinct – Food hubs and satellite precincts are distinguished by productive
land - not to be confused with an urban farm because precincts are defined by
their incorporation of each food system element with processing, storage, and
food retail space– an aesthetically functioning productive landscape, more of
which will be explained later in this document.
• Greenhouses and Hoophouses – These structures are found at residences, food
precincts, urban farms, and local nurseries. They offer an extended growing
season because of their ability to retain heat and control climate.
• Institutions – Government buildings, churches, and schools are excellent grounds
for production and food related events. These places have the power to put
food on display, because of the nature of the business
of these places – people come and go frequently.
Therefore, food will get plenty of face time, and the
influence from these symbolic places in cities may
encourage citizens to grow at home, or inquire about
garden education.
Figure 3.8 - Urban Agriculture
demostration garden at City Hall,
Vancouver, BC.
Processing / Transportation & Storage
The goal of a sustainable food city is to grow, store, distribute, sell and enjoy
100% of what is grown locally before supplementing diets with imported foods, or
exporting any surplus products. Establishing city-centralized warehousing and processing
centers will help food businesses become more environmentally responsible. For
40
instance, produce will likely use less plastic wrap, Styrofoam packaging, and refrigeration
time, if it is grown, transported, sold and eaten locally. Therefore, a sustainable food city
will set policies addressing connections and transit methods between city retailers and
local farms in order to tighten the connection between food travel and the length of time
food takes to get from its origin to dinner plates.
A sustainable food city will provide sustainable approach for farmers to locally
process and store goods. A local cattle farmer can pay a local slaughterhouse, perhaps
located at a food precinct, to kill, cut, and process, his livestock. Grains and vegetables
can be processed preserved, and then stored, at a place like a food precinct. Farmers are
provided a local access to processing and a districution center at a food precinct, perhaps
a cost saving strategy. The localized food chain keeps profits and money exchanges
between local food system elements, boosting the local economy.
A sustainable food city will analyze the current state of food transit with a broad
scope addressing food miles and the quantity of imports. Production decisions can be
made based on these estimates, which will create a diverse growing season, offering more
local products, and adjusting import/export products according to harvest calculations.
Therefore, if Youngstown happens to have a record tomato harvest, it is possible for
many citizens to receive canned tomatoes from a local processor for winter storage; a
time where tomatoes would likely be bought from a grocer, but produced in the Southern
hemisphere, or thousands of miles away elsewhere.
Distribution and Food Sales
A sustainable food city analyzes the number of retail outlets and the relationship
of those places to its citizens and the multiple modes of transportation which people can
reach food sources. A sustainable food city seeks options to get people out of vehicles
with alternative methods of transit to food retailer similar to those in the list below– albeit
41
walking, biking, or rollerblades, etc. Therefore, the City of Youngstown will give people
the option to walk, bike, ride the bus, use light rail, and cars to culturally appropriate food
outlets. Getting to food outlets seems pretty straightforward, unless any of the presented
transit modes are absent from the city, and perhaps walking may be the lone option.
Ideally, people will be within a ten-minute walk to one of the following types of food
retail:
Types of Food Retail15
• Supermarket
• Neighborhood grocer
• Farmers’ Market
• Food Precinct
• Farm Stand
• Restaurant
• Street Vender
• Food Bank
• Community Kitchen
• Cultural Festival
Figure 3.9 - The Food Oasis/Food Desert diagram explores physical access to food. Because the food system strives to increase food
security, this model will create increase neighborhood food outlets to consumers seeking healthy, cultural, and non-emergency food
sources. Availability is the essence of access, and then creating safe infrastructure to get people to food places will render success.
42
Ten-minutes is quite different from one person to the next, but 800 meters is
roughly a ten-minute walk.16 The following list,17 highlights transit qualities Youngstown
will consider when planning for safe access to food:
• Healthy roads – multi-modal roadways safe for cars and bicycles: limited pot
holes, clear signage and directional markings to guide travelers
• Wide sidewalks – set back from streets make comfortable pedestrian passage
along corridors lined with edible plants and food features – Youngstown
sidewalks could be safer by encouraging set backs – and applying plant material
to beautify streets – edibles where appropriate.
• Distinct pedestrian crossings – signage, disparity of materials, at grade crosswalks
are visual indicators to motorists when entering pedestrian oriented areas There
is an important connection between localized food access and neighborhood and
regional growth patterns. Initiatives should drive protection of agricultural land,
promote dense development, while increasing access to food.
• Greenways – extended trailways intended for bicycles, runners, and walkers,
cutting through greenspace and natural landscapes – potential for greenway
development along Mahoning River and extinct rail beds. A greenway could
become a food delivery/distribution route. For example, a ‘bare-necessities’
food retail business could deliver milk, eggs, bread, fruit and vegetables, to
neighborhood by cyclist via a bike trail/greenway/bike lanes.
• Bike lanes – create bike lanes on city roads with lines and symbols to solidify
territory for cyclists – there are no existing bike lanes in Youngstown.
• Bus stops – increase access to public transit and Youngstown’s bus system
(WRTA), with more routes and boarding zones to get those without vehicles to
daily destinations.
• Clear signage – legible and communicative signage will make all travelers aware
of directions to food destinations and rights of way along streets – Youngstown
has a chance to identify neighborhoods and unify the city with distinct signage
characteristic of town and identity as a sustainable food city.
Consumption and Celebration18
Food is often a centerpiece of daily interaction: a coffee break, lunch with
colleagues, a dinner date with a spouse, and family reunions. Food is engaging – fragrant
– artful – inspiring sensations and emotions – triggering memories and inspiration.
43
Food can be glorified in Youngstown in many
ways: festivals, cook-off competitions, farmers
markets, and community picnics, all of which
could take place at a neighborhood food precinct
or a downtown food hub. In a sustainable food
city people of all cultures have opportunities to
present the nuances of their taste buds expanding
Figure 3.10 - Food Celebration- Food on display on
sidewalk at restaurant, edible plant material and signage
the palettes of their neighbors, while tying the
community together, developing new bonds and a new food identity.
Waste Recovery
Waste Recovery closes the loop of a sustainable food system – and often the most
overlooked piece of the puzzle. Approximately 24% of America’s waste stream comes
from organic waste – table scraps, coffee grinds, peels, stems, and even yard waste.19
Food itself makes up 12.7 percent of American waste,20 and to quantify this further,
32 million tons. Only three percent of
this extraordinary number is recycled.21
Therefore, about 31 million pounds
of food waste is dumped in landfills
annually, and under anaerobic conditions,
contributes to methane production, which
is a 21 times more potent greenhouse
gas than carbon dioxide. Landfills are
Figure 3.11 - United States waste breakdown - Source: E.P.A.
the largest producer of methane in the
United States, accounting for 34 percent of all methane emissions.22 Understanding the
contribution food waste has to the degradation of the environment and our atmosphere
is an indicator cities need to analyze their own waste streams and alternative methods to
44
handle food waste in order to reduce the impact on landfill and trash incinerators.
Below is a list of options available to Youngstown to address its waste. This list
is a combination of traditional and sustainable practices. The goal is to discover the most
sustainable method of food waste disposal. Youngstown will recognize a significant
savings in landfill space and economic savings, while enhancing food production, by
adhering to the following waste recovery principles.
Waste Disposal Options23
• Household garbage
• Landfill
• Incineration
• Home compost
• Biochar
• Municipal collection
• Municipal composting program
• Anaerobic digestion = biogas energy
• Anaerobic digestion = compost
• Livestock feed
• Municipal collection – Toronto is a prominent example with a citywide Green Bin
program that leads to a seven month composting process, which returns organic
fertilizer to the city free of charge, while drawing biogas energy from anaerobic
digesters during the seven month composting process.24
• Home Composting – support kitchen garden
• Neighborhood Collection – begin neighborhood composting to support
community gardens, or neighborhood food precinct
Importance of Waste Recovery and Recycling
• Decreases landfill and transportation costs25
• Reduces landfill capacity & pollution run off into local water sources26
45
• Decreases greenhouse fas emissions27
• Decreases use for petroleum based fertilizers – promotes healthier soils with
organic fertilizer/compost28
• Creates growing medium for local agriculture29
• Promotes anaerobic digestions and the production of biogas30
Toronto’s Municipal Green Bin Program
Toronto conducts a progressive waste-recycling program, called the Green Bin
Program, to collect organic waste to divert it from landfills and incinerators. 31 It started
the Green Bin program because of the high price of solid waste transportation costs it
was incurring shipping its waste to Michigan, due to a local landfill closure in 2002.32
Toronto realized opportunities to reduce its waste and energy output, save municipal
funds, and to create a product (biogas energy and organic fertilizer) for to reuse for the
benefit of Torontonians. San Francisco, CA, and Ottawa, ON, are two other notable cities
who have adopted similar organic recycling programs, and serve as excellent precedents
for Youngstown as it explores its potential to recycle food and organic wastes.
Figure 3.12 - Toronto Municipal Compost Process
The Green Bin Program is a cyclical system that collects food and yard waste, as
seen in the diagram in Figure 3.12, and is digested with the end product resulting in rich
compost and organic fertilizer to return to its citizens at no cost. This waste collection
program is promoting recycling and composting, and reduces landfill expansion. Also,
by taking a broad view of the green bin program, Toronto is promoting outdoor activity
46
and engagement with the residential landscape, and in relation to this project – growing
food and kitchen gardens. Therefore, Youngstown could essentially adopt a ‘Green Bin’
program similar to the one in Toronto, which could produce some of the fertilizer needs
for homeowners, community gardeners, and the proposed food precincts across the city,
while promoting active outdoor engagement and healthy lives.
Education
Education is the centerpiece of the sustainable food system diagram. A food
system cannot flourish without the understanding of all participants of each food system
element. The following list33 presents methods by which Youngstown will be able to
influence food system education to its citizens:
• Schools – have the power of influencing the habits of young minds, which can
trickle into homes as children could have the urge to impress new found food
system knowledge to parents
• Local Government – displays of community gardens on government property,
such as that in Vancouver, BC, can demonstrate local support for starting home
gardens and influencing the spread of a local food culture
• Farmers – excellent resources for learning the intricacies of growing food, they
even have great recipe ideas. Inquirers can find farmers at farmers markets where
one will garner invaluable face-to-face time with their food producer, processor,
transporter, and retailer.
• Community Gardens – knowledgeable neighbors will likely spread food
knowledge to other local growers and those interested in becoming apart of the
community. Community gardens hold events throughout the growing season to
inspire and attract new gardeners and share methods and ideas with neighboring
gardeners.
• Food Precincts – A food precinct incorporates each element of a food system on
its grounds. It provides cooking classes, composting classes and informational
signage at compost areas. A regular farmers’ market will provide opportunity to
meet farmers’.
• Neighbors – Spread the love of food. If one person learns a new recipe, then he
or she should teach two other people the recipe and ask them to teach two others
each.
47
• Community Kitchens & Food Banks – cooking classes and how to shop for
healthy food.
• Grocers – will help read labeling and understand the retail interface so that
citizens can easily locate the food necessary to support their families.
• Chefs and Restaurants – spread rich, cultural cuisine throughout the city –
knowing how to pair food with beverage can be a challenge at home, but listening
to a chef or the wait staff will increase knowledge of complimentary foods and
beverages.
Sustainable Food Systems Response
This chapter presented the components of a sustainable food system and how
Youngstown can become a sustainable food city. It will have to evaluate its food system
and adopt appropriate methods it feels will strengthen citizens’ food access, food health,
and perhaps discover ways to create jobs and income through the food industry. The city
has the opportunity for food to rule the landscape and the economy. Food lots equal food
jobs.
The remainder of this document will present one method to do so, with the
conceptual planning of Grow Youngstown, a network of food precinct and the design of
the network’s food hub.
48
Endnotes
1
HB Lanarc, Agricultural Urbanism,
http://www.agriculturalurbanism.com/surfs.php, (Vancouver, BC, 2009).
2
Ibid.
3
Janine de la Salle and Kyle Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities: A handbook
for planners designers and government,” (HB Lanarc: Vancouver, BC, 2009), 6.
12
HB Lanarc, Agricultural Urbanism, http://www.agriculturalurbanism.com,
(Vancouver, BC, 2009).
13
Janine de la Salle and Kyle Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities: A handbook
for planners designers and government,” (HB Lanarc: Vancouver, BC, 2009).
14
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 11.
15
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 25.
16
Ibid.
17
Ibid.
18
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 12.
19
Gwedolyn Bounds, “New, Easy-to-use composters,”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704107204574471330808326
984.html, October 13, 2009.
20
EPA, “Basic information about food waste – organic materials,”
http://www.epa.gov/osw/conserve/materials/organics/food/fd-basic.htm, 2009.
21
Ibid.
22
Ibid.
23
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 13.
24
City of Toronto, “City of Toronto: Solid Waste Management – Green Bin
Program,” Retrieved July 30, 2009 from
http://www.toronto.ca/greenbin/index.htm. Toronto, ON, 2009.
49
25
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 27.
26
Ibid..
27
Ibid.
28
Alexa Kielty, “San Francisco’s Food Composting Program,”,Department of the
Environment, San Francisco, CA, Mid-Atlantic Organics Summit, November 30,
2006, 43,
29
Ibid.
30
Ibid.
31
City of Toronto, 2009.
32
Ibid.
33
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 7.
50
Grow Youngstown
Food Precinct Planning and Food Hub Design
This chapter presents a written and illustrated description of the planning and
design process for Grow Youngstown, an organization of food precincts. First, food
precincts will be defined and outlined according to design principles, which will guide
the program for a food hub. Second, a presentation of a conceptual plan for a network of
food precincts throughout the city will demonstrate the positive impact a food precinct
could have on the city and its neighborhoods. Finally, the design for the downtown food
hub will be presented through detailed images and detail description, providing a clear
representation of a visitor’s experience.
Food Precinct1
Food precincts are places visibly
focused on food and agriculture,2 and
influenced by the principles of sustainable food
systems. The programmatic elements of a
food precinct interact harmoniously, promoting
sustainable agriculture, organic food, local
food promotion and sales, while introducing
Figure 4.1 - Food Precinct network conceptual diagram
food education for local citizens, including food safety, cooking, canning, composting,
and even learning to grow food in a home garden. As seen in the conceptual diagram
in Figure 4.1, food precincts are often apart of a greater network of food facilities, with
centrally located hub surrounded by satellite (neighborhood) precincts.
51
Food precincts mix agriculture and food system functions, including, farming,
distribution, processing, eating, and education.3 A neighborhood precinct supports the
food hub and nearby residents, by offering food retail, an area for crop growth, education
(cooking, gardening, food preserving) and food related community events. The satellites
have the potential to be themed, or to obtain distinct purposes in relation to the needs of
the entire precinct network. For example, in Youngstown, a particular precinct may be
focused on raising livestock, as opposed to one across town, which may feature orchards.
The products of these precincts are sold in the neighborhood, but are also harvested,
processed, and marketed at the food hub’s marketplace or farmers market.
A food precinct enables local food and farmers to connect to communities
efficiently and economically.4 Food precincts are different from a shopping district
because they feature on site food production. Production and manufacturing are absent
in a retail district.5 A food precinct contains eateries and incorporates all the food that
is produced on site into its menu, and then replenishes the system with unused food and
organic waste – separating a food precinct from outside food entities. This model will
provide an opportunity for growers to sell their food to the precinct marketplace. The
precinct can take the position of the major supplier of local food – giving people who
choose not to grow food at home or at a community garden, physical access to similar
products their neighbors may grow.
Benefits of the food precinct and food hub include:6
• Increasing essential food and agriculture infrastructure such as processing and
sales capacity to the small to medium farm economy.
• Centralized distribution point(s) that enable purchasing by wholesalers, grocery
stores, and restaurants from multiple farms and producers.
• Increased community access to experiencing and purchasing local foods.
• Community, professional, and academic learning opportunities focused on food
and sustainability.
52
• A tangible, visible connection between eaters and growers.
• A conscious planning and design approach to sustainable food cities.
• Job creation in the local food economy.
• Become the new face of downtown Youngstown.
Design and Technical Considerations7
Food precincts have specific structural needs, including space for crop growth
and public gatherings and events. The programmatic elements will guide this project
from site analysis to site planning, and through site design – incorporating the elements
of the list below into the design program. Many of these elements require the design
and development of a building and interior space, which is greater than the scope of this
project. Therefore, many of these elements, if not directly detailed into the final design
solution, will be discussed during the conceptual design phase.
A food precinct is organized by the following programmatic elements, all of which
will be considered while designing Youngstown’s food precinct:
• Productive agriculture landscape – growing food that is visible to the public –
promoting it as a design element to spread food growth throughout a city
• Waste collection and recycling – visible organic waste collection area that will be
converted into compost to be reused by food precinct to grow annual crops
• Commercial scale storage space and processing/packaging facilities
• Permanent farmers market – indoor and outdoor space for the promotion,
education, and sales for local farm products
• Event space – an area for food festivals and farmers markets are important – this
is where creativity will flourish incorporating interactive spaces indoors and
outdoor, perhaps melding the two areas together
• Restaurant or Café – celebrate food and eat food hand picked from the precinct
itself
• Office space – precinct related business needs space to operate – perhaps on a
second floor separate from commerce and precinct interaction
53
• Education – a classroom in the form of a kitchen, greenhouse, composting
bin, and interpretive signage will promote community knowledge on growing,
processing, and preparing local food.
• Kitchen & Classroom – potential connection to restaurant & café to share a
kitchen with an education space
• Loading/Delivery zones – accessible to market for sales and processing center
• Sun and Water –agriculture plots should be exposed to the sky while spigots and
hose access should be nearby to cool crops when the sun intensifies
• Water source – access to public water main or natural water body
• Rainwater harvesting – use visible cisterns for collection to supply precinct with
irrigation water
• Building potential – reuse existing or vacant buildings/land
• Strive for energy efficiency –passive solar heating, sustainable energy,
• Recycled materials – from bath tubs for raised farm beds to retired railroad ties
for walkways – utilizing local materials from local sites will cut down GHG and
present opportunities to relate to local architecture themes
Management Considerations 8
A food precinct will operate in a variety of ways. Satellite/neighborhood precincts
and other related businesses will operate under the governance of the food hub. There are
many types of people from chefs, farmers, and community leaders, who may participate
in a food precinct as a form of employment, or as a volunteer, depending upon the
structure of a particular location. The following list provides insight as to how a food
precinct could be managed and who might be a part of these alliances.
• Non-profit business – recommended choice to ensure focus and application of
local food initiatives – better chance of success when if food precinct is a business
model
• Social enterprise – for profit business venture with social and environmental
purposes driving business decisions
• Local government
• Neighborhood precincts run by a citizen volunteer groups
54
• Farmers – who or desire promoting their crops at a local central hub
• Food processors – opportunity for new business at precinct
• Packaging businesses
• Chefs and restaurant owners – who desire access to local food sources
• Food retailers – who desire to purchase/sell local food in their stores
• School board – the connection between the food precinct and youth
• Local food bank
• Consumers
These lists, especially the design considerations, will drive the focus for the
design of the food hub; the design will be presented later in the chapter. Before
discussing design details, the next few sections will discuss and analyze the selection of
food precinct sites, and present a conceptual plan for a Grow Youngstown: a network of
food precincts revolving around the food hub as conveyed by the plan in Figure 4.2.
Food Hub
The Grow Youngstown food hub is the place where the majority of food commerce
and business will occur within the Grow Youngstown network. Grow Youngstown
operations and governance occurs at the food hub. Figure 4.2, on page 56, reveals the
centralized location site chosen in downtown Youngstown. One that is equally accessible
to citizens, and obtains certain characteristics supporting site selection. These include,
ample vacant land for potential food production, existing buildings for potential reuse,
public visibility, a government presence, and support, and water access.
The proposed site, shown in Figure 4.3, on page 57, is on the Mahoning River
and adjacent to the Market Street bridge. City Hall and various government buildings
lie north near the edge of the site – an important measure to establish government or
mayoral support for food a local food movement. The site offers premium visibility for
55
m
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Harding Elementary
Hayes Middle
m
n
Odyssey: School of Possibilities
P. Ross Berry Middle
m
n
Food Hub
m
n
m
n
St. Patrick’s
m
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East High
Williamson Elementary
Youngstown City School District
Volney Rogers Middle
Alpha: School of Excellence for Boys
m
n
m
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Cardinal Mooney
Kirkmere Elementary
m
n
µ
0
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m
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Legend
n
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High School
Junior High School
Elementary School
Prepared by: The Center for
Urban and Regional Studies
Youngstown State University
Source: Mahoning County
Enterprise GIS Files, Yng.
Board of Education
11.16.07
Figure 4.2 - Grow Youngstown Network - Satellite precincts radiate around the downtown food hub.
m Plan
n
Map Source: Youngstown 2010 Citywide
a food precinct, and the promotion of a budding food culture in downtown Youngstown.
This location on the river also promotes green space – an essential city element which
downtown Youngstown lacks. The food hub will act as a downtown urban park, but one
dominated by the presence of food. People will be able to visit and relax as if strolling
through a traditional urban park or plaza. Visitors will benefit through the interaction
with edible plant material, educational signage interpreting food agricultural practices,
recipes, compost, and other information.
Downtown restaurants and Youngstown State students will benefit from the short
walk (see Figure 4.4 on page 57) to direct market access to food, potential jobs, and
social events. Also, local citizens and daily business transplants will be enticed to visit
the food hub by the intense agricultural display and the bustling nature of the marketplace
56
Stambaugh Field
Hillman Park
Falls Ave.
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Prepared by: The Center for
Urban and Regional Studies
Youngstown State University
Source: Mahoning County
Enterprise GIS Files, YSU,
City of Youngstown
1.29.08
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Figure 4.4 - Pedestrian Shed - Downtown inhabitants will have a short walk to food precinct. YSU student will walk approximately
6-8 minutes to reach Grow Youngstown. Map Source: Youngstown State University
57
and shops. Youngstown State University could supply its dining services with food from
Grow Youngstown. A relationship between the university and Grow Youngstown could
inspire culinary arts and sustainable agriculture curriculums. The food hub exists as
the pulse of Youngstown food culture, and will strive to promote and food related sales,
event, or food related activity supporting Youngstown to become a sustainable food city.
Satellite/Neighborhood Branches
Satellite branches are food precincts located within city neighborhood
surrounding the food hub. They can be schools, churches, institutions, community
gardens, urban farms, or a local grocer, as long as food production occurs on site.
Satellites support the food hub in its efforts to promote locally food and help carry out
Grow Youngstown’s initiatives. Satellites have educational functions to teach people how
to garden, cook, and preserve food. Food grown at a satellite location can be bought and
sold on site, or be transported to the food hub to be sold downtown. Satellites operate
under the umbrella of Grow Youngstown and its philosophy, but may in fact govern its
own location at will. They have the freedom to have food festivals, classes, or garden
parties, for its own neighborhood without coordinating with the food hub.
As previously presented in Figure 4.2, this project suggests Youngstown schools
can be viable satellites. Schools have an inherent education base, which could start
food education for youth. Schools are embedded in neighborhoods and offer users local
access to a community gardens, food education for students and adults, establishing an
interface for students to learn about food through crop care. The food students cultivate
can be incorporated into healthy lunch programs. The influence of food in schools will
theoretically percolate into the homes, as children will introduce the presence of food in
the neighborhood to their parents, which will spark community involvement.
58
Planning Response
The proposed Youngstown Food Precinct Network focuses on using schools as
satellites to support the food hub. The satellite networks are less evolved than the food
hub, but each grew out of the opportunity to produce food and the embeddedness of
educational opportunities, which are the essential elements for a food precinct to exist.
There are many other suitable candidates in churches, parks, and businesses, which are
able to meet this criteria and desire to be apart of the food precinct network.
Youngstown’s food precinct network is proposed comprising of only schools
as satellites, because schools provided the greatest potential to support the needs and
principles of a food precinct. Schools present benefits for satellite food precincts because
there have established population and community through families. The presence of
education is strong in school, which, recalling the sustainable food system diagram,
is the foundation of a sustainable food system. In the future, planners might discover
alternative opportunities and additions to the network through organizations willing to
promote Youngstown’s local food movement.
59
Design Discussion
Food Hub: Inventory and Analysis
The following commentary will present an inventory of the current site conditions
for the proposed food hub. An analysis of the conditions will be made with consideration
for design opportunities and constraints, while beginning to visualize how programmatic
elements will be organized to create a vibrant food hub and downtown commercial
location.
The downtown location
yields great visibility for the food
hub. Visibility will be important for
Youngstown to change their image
to a sustainable food city. Consistent
visualization of food establishes its
presence and a local food culture will
gradually develop - made possible
through educational initiatives, business
participation, and active participation
Figure 4.5 - Context Diagram - the relationships between the food
hub and the downtown districts influences the prosperity of Grow
Youngstown
from citizens. Nonetheless, the
proposed site for the Grow Youngstown offers strong connections to the surrounding
downtown context shown in Figure 4.5, and is easily accessible for Youngstown citizens
reach with its location nearby several major downtown gateways.
Gateways
The entry experience into Grow Youngstown should hold great presence, and
travelers should recognize where they are based on the site’s food theme. The Market
60
Figure 4.6 - Site Gateways
Street Bridge will introduce people to Grow Youngstown traveling north/south. (See
Figure 4.6 to locate the gateways.)
Driving into the site on the Market Street Bridge visitors will immediately
recognize the Wean United steel fabrication facility, shown in Figures 4.7 and
4.8. It is an incredible structure with much to offer a food precinct. The massive
structure is a combination of large warehouse sized buildings once used to
Figure 4.7- Wean United - view driving into site toward
downtown on Market Street Bridge from South
Figure 4.8 - Wean United - view driving into site from
downtown at traffic light at north end of bridge
61
fabricate steel rolls and other steel products. This building will serve as the heartbeat
of Grow Youngstown. However, the bridge is a dominant aspect of this landscape.
It divides the site creating two distinct feelings. The barren, overgrown, desolate,
eastern half; and the industrial western half, empty in many regards, but are shaped and
characterized by the Wean United facilities.
From the ground perspective on site, the bridge as an overhead plane could be
overwhelming to visitors. Furthermore, the scene beneath the bridge and along the edges
of Emily Street are overgrown and unattractive, an effort will need to be made to make
this road and the surrounding environment an
attractive and cohesive design transition (See
Figure 4.9 to get a feeling for the environment
beneath the bridge). An effort to create an
attractive element directly beneath the bridge
may create a more comfortable pedestrian
experience and transition.
Figure 4.9 - Environment beneath Market Street Bridge
Site Entrances
There are few points of entry serving as transitions from the downtown core into
the food hub. These could be used to establish an element of excitement for access to
food and the Grow Youngstown. Refer to Figure 4.10 on the following page during the
following commentary, which analyzes proposed points of entry:
1. Phelps St. – adjacent to Youngstown City Hall. This street could become an entry
walk and is represented by the red arrows. Its current conditions are shown in
Figures 4.11 and 4.12. Phelps Street is a directly connects Grow Youngstown to
Youngstown State, which makes this entrance important, because of pedestrian
traffic coming from the university district.
62
City Hall
Figure 4.10 - Site Entrances and potential vehicular connections
There is concern for truck accessibility to delivery facilities in the building. There
will need to be ample space for small delivery truck access for food storage and
farmers market ventures. There are a few ways to solve this dilemma, which are
represented by the blue arrows in Figure 4.10.
Figure 4.11- Phelps Street - Entry Conditions - gov’t parking
Figure 4.12 - Phelps Street - Entry Conditions
63
a. Emily Street provides truck access by connecting to Hamilton Street,
which parallels the north edge of the Wean United facility.
b. Trucks can drive to the end of Emily Street, which is currently a dead end.
This of the road could become an intersection of a street and a plaza. A
truck could turn toward the buildings and deliver goods to a point in the
buildings.
c. Another option to provide truck access directly down Phelps Street and
around to delivery areas, to relieve site pedestrians from automobile
interaction.
2. Convention Center
a. The convention center entry drive, shown in Figure 4.13, provides an
opportunity to access the food hub. The parking lot could be shared by
the two properties. The drive could be connected to a proposed road way
that could connect to Emily Street, as represented by the black arrows in
Figure 4.10. This gateway proposes a couple different opportunities:
b. Convention center parking (purple box in Figure 4.10) lot could be shared
with Grow Youngstown, also providing another gateway opportunity.
c. If a proposed road connects the
convention center parking lot and
the Emily Street, the road could
become the main entrance to the
food precinct, leading to parking
along an access road or a larger
lot.
Figure 4.13 - Road connection to Convention Center Lot
64
Wean United Facilities
The steel fabrication structure consists of numerous large connected warehousetype buildings, which can be renovated for new uses. The buildings will provide ample
space for food storage, shipping and receiving, processing facilities – a butcher, a
baker, a fruit and vegetable cannery – indoor growing and hydroponic agriculture, and a
marketplace for food shops, such as cafes, candy stores, restaurants, and an indoor food
retail marketplace. The manner in which the interior spaces interact with the landscape is
important to the design, which presents exciting opportunities during design exploration,
as the functions of interior and exterior spaces will collide to transform the overgrown
weedy landscape into a vibrant riverfront industrial public space similar to many public
plazas and parks common to urban areas.
Refer to Figure 4.16, on page 67, to understand the exact area of the Wean United being
analyzed during the following commentary:
• Building 1: The interior of this facility is impressive and it may have had some
interaction and direct connection with freight trains, because an extinct railway is
present on the ground shown in Figure 4.14. The interior details are quite unique
and need to be preserved to relish the integrity
and design beauty of the past (see Figure 4.15).
The brick arches will preserve the building’s
history with steel and the railroad to remind
visitors of the past, as the site forges ahead with a
new program and a new vision for Youngstown as
a sustainable food city.
Unlike the other buildings on site, Building 1
presents an opportunity to create a greenhouse
Figure 4.14 - Rail running through Building 1
65
or hydroponic growing facility. Ceiling is quite high in and the roof could be
converted to glass material. The architectural detailing of the interior is too
unique to relinquish the use of the space as a storage/processing facility.
• Building 2 & 3: These buildings were unable to be explored during site
Figure 4.15 -Building 1 Interior - Large facility which may have been a shipping and receiving location - high ceilings and attractive
architecture - potential to fit exterior with glass to promote transparency and sunlight for greenhouse conditions
reconnaissance. They were locked and windows were far higher than the eye
could see. However, potential program opportunities for Building 2 lie in office
space for businesses, which would lease space from the precinct itself. Businesses
will hold a relationship with the food precinct: restaurants, special food retailers,
such as, candy stores or coffee shops, a butcher selling locally raise livestock,
and so forth. However, the building is quite large and boasts opportunities for
potential processing space, even a brewery, which gathers its hops harvested from
on site and city agriculture plots. Its size may be suitable to carry fermentation
tanks and brewing infrastructure to make beer from hops grown within the food
precinct network.
• Building 3 is currently an office for Youngstown Pipe Supply. The connection
between 3&4 can be redesigned to become a grand entrance to the food hub. This
linear building helps create a strong diagonal axis across the entire site. Building
3 has potential to become a place for food sales. Its location in relevance to
66
Figure 4.16 - Wean United Facility Diagram
parking and a viable entrance on Phelps Street would give visitors the shortest
walk to their vehicles or wherever they may be walking.
• Building 4: It was immediate knowledge upon the discovery of the façade shown
in Figure 4.17 that this building is
suitable for shipping and receiving,
which makes this building suitable for
storage. The soaring structure could be
adapted to handle an extensive amount
of food storage - perishable and non
perishable.
Figure 4.17 - Building 4 appears most suitable to function as a
storage facility with its shipping and delivery capabilities
• Building 5: This building wedged
in the middle of the complex was another space that was not explored during
67
site reconnaissance. However, this building might be an optimal location for
processing facility. Many types of processing could occur here: the canning
and preservation of produce grown on site or from surrounding neighborhood
precincts, livestock butchering, canning nuts gathered from trees around the city.
The processing facility will also package and ship precinct related goods
purchased by local restaurants and grocers. It is important to understand
the Grow Youngstown food hub as a community food center. Anyone in the
community will be able to have their products processed in the hub’s facilities,
regardless whether citizens are entrepreneurs or recreational food producers.
• Building 6: Like Building 1, Building 6 has potential for multiple functions. The
roof could be converted to a transparent surface to promote passive solar heating
and potential for greenhouse produce or hydroponics. This space could be an
place for food retail (see Figure 4.18). An open marketplace might benefit an allseason experience where visitors could
stroll around to various vendors. Small
restaurants and food retail business
could sell food grown on site and at
local neighborhood precincts, made by
local businesses, or Youngstown citizens
who chose to sell there surplus crops to
the food precinct, or area farmers.
Figure 4.18 - Building 6 is suitable for many functions with
a delivery outlet and vast amount of space.
The downside to the potential for a marketplace in this building is the relative
distance it lies from parking facilities. Visitors would have to trek to buy food and
68
then haul is back to the parking lot. This goes against the logic behind planning
parking in front of today’s supermarkets: parking is directly in front. Regardless
of the final proposal, building 6 will interact with many adjacent spaces and their
functions - potentially becoming the epicenter of the food precinct, because of its
for consistent activity. One can envision
a relationship between the marketplace
and an event space, or a production
zone between the building and the river.
Conceptual design proposals will later
reveal the best layout, program, and
function between these buildings, their
space, and the exterior environment.
Figure 4.19 - Building 6 Entrance - door interfaces with
exterior area and potential link to plaza/event space
Vacant Land
Much of the land surrounding the Wean United facility is vacant and overgrown,
but has potential to be adapted for food production. The areas also have potential to be
plazas, event spaces, places to eat, and demonstration areas. The site has full exposure
to the sun, which aside from water and quality soil (discussed later), provides positive
growing conditions.
It is important to consider food
celebration and eating. Event space and outdoor
farmers’ market space provides an interface
between people, local farmers, nutrition, and a
variety of great tastes, drawing people to Grow
Youngstown. The areas to the north and south
of the Wean United facility are most suitable to
Figure 4.20 - Overgrown land - This swath of land between
the building facilities and the river provides many design
opportunity to engage people, food, and cultural events
69
become plazas, because their relationship with the facility provides continual interaction
between people and activity on the interior. This will promote an active dialogue
between people, food, and Grow Youngstown.
Railroad
An interesting aspect and potential design feature to work with are the extinct rail
lines on site. The 1910 panoramic photograph (see Figure 4.21) of the site reveals the
numerous trains shipping freight to the site. East of the bridge, Republic Steel, a major
steel presence in Youngstown, had numerous manufacturing facilities puffing smoke
above the downtown skyline. A 1907 Sanborn Fire Insurance map in Figure 4.22, shows
all the active railways during the height of the industrial era. It suggests the ghost of the
previous rail system can be used to organize site circulation.
Figure 4.21 - View of site in 1910, a particular look at the railroad and its integration with the site and factories
Figure 4.22 - 1907 Sanborn map reveals old rail lines and factory building footprints. Each can be instituted design elements or
organizing elements to the design for Grow Youngstown.
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Topography
With the exception of a few areas, the site topography, shown in Figure 4.23,
represents a gradually sloping landscape from front street to the Mahoning River. A
detention basin lies in the middle of the eastern side of the site. The surrounding chain
link fence is a design constraint. For the sake of completing this project and to focus on
food, it will be assumed that this area of the site will be properly dealt with to promote
the completion of this project’s goals, shifting the purpose of the area elsewhere on site.
The land generally appears to have been lying dormant of any specific use for
years. The site contains piles of gravel, scrap metal from steel mill deconstruction,
railroad ties, or generally invasive weedy plant species, or opportunistic trees. The
current vegetation will have to be removed to create viable food production zones on site.
Figure 4.23 - Site Topography Map - Source Mahoning County
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Eradication will occur through non-chemical methods, such as tilling or removing the
top layer of soil and vegetation, and replacing the excavated material with a rich growing
medium.
Soils
Although previously delimited in the introductory chapter, soil remediation
and testing deserves reemphasis with a brief discussion on their purpose, because soil
quality is a big concern for this site since it is a post-industrial landscape that will serve
agricultural practices. Edible plant material needs healthy, clean, soil, not only for plants
will grow properly, but also for the safety of human consumption. The industrial history
of the site suggests the site’s soil composition might consist of heavy metal contaminants
undesirable for food growth. Soil tests will prove what areas of the site will need soil
rehabilitation, which could entail excavation, tilling and soil amendments, and possibly
some type of membrane barrier to prohibit certain contaminants from interacting with
growing mediums and plant roots. Phytoremediation is another employable remediation
method.
When site soils are ripe for growing, the site provides the opportunity for crops
to flourish. There is ample space to introduce many plots and plants types, and the site’s
orientation provides nearly full sun exposure to crops. The only hindrance is the Market
Street Bridge on the east side crops in late afternoon, and the trees of the Mahoning
River bank on the space between the Wean building and the river in the late afternoon.
Otherwise, the vast area could pose a large crop yield for the food precinct to sell.
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Transition to Design
The analysis presented in this section has addressed the design opportunities
and restraints. The site has essentially unlimited potential to serve a food precinct. The
central location will serve Youngstown as its food hub, and main source for locally grown
food. Daily traffic will come from the downtown workforce and those passing through
downtown wanting to pause for food or groceries, and fun. Those who do not make
it downtown will also have their taste of local food through Grow Youngstown sales
to local food retailers and restaurants. As desire grows for local food in Youngstown,
the more property the downtown food precinct will be able to garner to expand its
production, which will serve the city by filling the voids of vacant land.
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Food Hub Concept
At the site scale, Grow Youngstown is an example of a sustainable food system
and Youngstown’s greater food system. It demonstrates the cycle of food and its journey
from its roots to the mouths of the hungry. Grow Youngstown is a vibrant organization,
which will attract shoppers, farmers selling and processing their goods, hungry lunch
time crowds of the downtown business district, and students from Youngstown State and
surrounding public schools in search of food and agriculture knowledge.
Organizational Concept
The 1907 Sanborn fire insurance maps reveals the organizational concept for
Grow Youngstown (See Figure 4.24). Site desire lines are conceived from Phelps Street’s
connection to Youngstown State University, Market Street’s presence dividing the site,
the strong linear orientation of the Grow Youngstown’s facility, and the old building
footprint of the site of the current Covelli Convention Center. These desire lines establish
axes connecting the site and the surrounding context and establishes an organizational
concept for the program.
Figure 4.24 - Design Organization is based off of desire lines of Phelps Street, Market Street, the strong diagonal linear forms of Wean
United, and the site where Covelli Convention Center lies today.
74
Factory footprints of the once vibrant steel-manufacturing site present a dynamic
opportunity to preserve the history of this site and trigger the memory of Youngstown’s
population. The Sanborn maps show the locations of these extinct machines. These
buildings will be brought back to life, perhaps not in similar form as their predecessors,
but at a scale suitable for food production. These design elements, the hop house,
composting area, edible entrance, hanging garden, chicken coop, and greenhouses, will
reflect shades of Youngstown’s past by giving the site memory as it transforms into food
precinct. People will learn of their significance throughout a walk about the educational
trail, which will present these structures past and present. The forms of these structures
may not take on the language evident of 1907; however, the historical influence will
present a simple structure representing a reflection of the site’s layout one hundred years
ago.
Circulation
Site circulation is influenced by the railroad lines, which once ran through the
site in 1907. The Sanborn map reveals the routes freight cars transported goods to and
from former steel mills. The railroad lines create paths and connections suitable for site
visitors to experience Grow Youngstown, and provide staff proper access and direction in
carrying out daily tasks throughout the site.
Design Concept
Grow Youngstown’s program layout, conceptual shown in Figure 4.25, revolves
around how people will interact with the site, especially downtown inhabitants.
For instance, Youngstown State University is less than a ten-minute walk to Grow
Youngstown; and between YSU and Grow Youngstown lies the downtown business
district, which immediately gives Grow Youngstown a base for food sales, especially
if lunch is sold in its eateries. Therefore, with the lack of restaurants downtown, it is
75
Figure 4.25 - Site Concept Diagram - displays relationships between the food hub site and surrounding
downtown context and among site program elements
plausible that people would venture to Grow Youngstown to eat, influencing prosperity
on the city’s new sustainable food hub.
Grow Youngstown’s landscape will be viewed by people through an agricultural
lens via the educational trail. However, daily interaction between people and food will
commonly occur in the marketplace. The marketplace is particularly important because
people will likely venture to Grow Youngstown to buy food or eat. Therefore, the
location of restaurants and grocers is key to visitor interaction. Marketplaces and most
restaurants are located nearest to Front Street with the idea that many people living and
working in the downtown area will have nearest access to eateries and grocers. The lone
exception to this is the Republic of Beer, which in the rear plaza, and is a destination
76
for beer lovers and those looking for quality nightlife. It is a place where people seek
to enjoy the fruits of local agricultural and their hometown. People will frequent The
Republic of Beer to enjoy local beer, and the pride of having a local brewer in town,
which would likely be a draw for beer lovers, along with small scale cultural events.
Other significant areas considered during conceptual design were large spaces
for event and festival space. The event plaza and lawn share an interesting relationship
in that they are divided by the Market Street bridge, but the periphery beneath the bridge
provides easy pedestrian access and comfortable connection for a large food festival.
The lawn and plaza will operate daily like typical civic spaces do, then combine during a
seasonal beer festival, for example, creating lively multifunctional areas to accommodate
many activities and uses.
Productive spaces are located based on the exposure to sunlight, and the
opportunity to reveal the footprints of the former industrial infrastructure with vertical
growing structures. These space are interactive spaces, but people will be able to learn
about their historical precedence and their new functions through interpretive signage.
The Covelli Convention Center is a static element on site, which had to be dealt
with in a way to understand that people visiting events there would have the opportunity
to eat and celebrate at Grow Youngstown. These people will pass through the productive
land before reaching places to eat and drink, which instills a particular sense of place and
a theme of food and a focus on food production.
77
Master Plan
The elements of a sustainable food system have driven this design for Grow
Youngstown: production, processing, storage and transportation, marketing, eating and
celebration, and waste recovery. The land use map in Figure 4.27, on page 79, represents
how the site incorporates elements of a sustainable food system, which sets up an
adaptation of the program derived from the aforementioned list of design and technical
considerations on page 53. Also, as the design is discussed, refer to the master plan on
page 80.
The main food precinct facility, the renovated Wean United factory, hosts many
functions of the overall operation. In fact, visitors will recognize each element of the
sustainable food system within its walls. Not represented on the land use map, but
equally important, are the multifunctional uses of these spaces and their alternative
function as education and classroom spaces. Kitchens, processing facilities, and indoor
growing areas are also suitable for community education, perhaps not for extended
lectures, but certainly practical hands on education. The hydroponic growing facilities
represented in Figure 4.30, on page 81, convert the interior shown in Figure 4.29 into
a multilevel production machine. Grow Youngstown converts three open warehouses
into growing facilities to supplement traditional agriculture models in the surrounding
production areas: cover crop rows, orchards,
greenhouses, pots, raised beds around plaza areas,
and hanging (pergola) gardens.
Visitors can experience much of the site on
the educational trail, which is diagrammed above
in Figure 4.26. The trail begins at the information
center inside the facility’s main entrance on Phelps
Figure 4.26 - Educational Trail Diagram
78
79
Market
Livestock area
Vertical Growing
Cover Crops
Orchards
Storage Facility
Processing Facilities
Event Space/Eating
Farmers Market
Waste Recovery
Office Space
Figure 4.27 - Grow Youngstown land use map
O N
M P I
C H A
E T
M A R K
L P S
P H E
Map Key
E
A City Hall
D
D
B
E
B Event Plaza
V U
C Festival Lawn
D Apple Orchard
T
C
E Restaurant
O
F Edible Entrance W
G Covelli Convention Center
S
P
H Hanging Garden
M
R
I Chicken Coop
N
J Compost Area
L
K Greenhouses
L Hop House
Q
M Friday Night Market
M
N Hydroponic Facility
A
O Marketplace
P Republic of Beer
H
Q Learning Circle
O
R Republic Plaza
N
S Hydroponic Facility
I
G
T Processing Facility
N
U Storage Facility
V Delivery Area
W Compost Area
Figure 4.28 - Grow Youngstown Food Hub - Master Plan
A
K
R
F
N U T
W A L
80
V
Master Plan
E
R
D
H
GROW YOUNGSTOWN
I
J
I
G
F R O N T S T R E E T
Figure 4.29 - Existing conditions before hydroponics.
Figure 4.30 - Hydroponics - Grow Youngstown will use the building for hydroponic food production
81
Street, which leads people into the plaza just outside the building, where people will
immediately see demonstrations of food production, on the ground and vertically, as the
southern façade of city hall is transformed into an edible wall. (See the before and after
images of City Hall in Figures 4.31 and 4.32.)
The plaza is a traditional urban square, where people can come to enjoy a moment
alone beneath a tree or next to a water feature. It may become an refuge for site workers
to ease their daily grind. The plaza’s existing conditions are shown in Figure 4.33 before
its rendering in Figure 4.34, which presents the plaza during an event. A stage and ample
hard surface create an area for people to enjoy a performance. The plaza could program
annual, monthly, and weekly events, such as a seasonal beer festival highlighting Grow
Youngstown’s own brewery, Republic of Beer, made from products grown on site.
The plaza and the lawn area create a continuous festival space with many different
scenes, sounds, and textures, including edible plant material and people harvesting food.
These spaces will create an enjoyable experience for users coming to Youngstown’s
festivals. Tents and vendors can set up within these spaces to sell food, artistry, and other
products appropriate to festival themes to visitors and Youngstown visitors.
The educational trail, which also provides small vehicle maintenance access for
Grow Youngstown staff, continues through the site stopping at (in order of appearance)
the edible entrance, hops house, chicken coop, hanging gardens, composting area, and
greenhouses, which are among the aforementioned initiatives to create memory on site
and the remembrance of the site’s industrial era. The structural forms of various buildings
rely only on the footprint provided by the 1907 Sanborn Map, as imagery is available,
but unattainable. Therefore, these structures each take on their own forms and aesthetics
dictated by the designer, not necessarily indicative of its industrial ancestors.
82
83
Figure 4.31 -Plaza Present - Proposed location for plaza is currently a parking lot and a metal yard between City Hall (shown here) and the Wean United Facility
84
City Hall Vertical Garden
Plaza for events and festivals
Figure 4.32 - Entry Plaza Future between Grow Youngstown and City Hall, which becomes a demonstration for vertical farming
Visible/Interactive
Food Growing
Downtown Youngstown
85
Figure.34 - Event Space - Plaza is adaptable for large events or everyday civic activity
Figure 4.33 - Current view of proposed plaza space - Government Parking Lot
Figure 4.35 - Current view of site entry from convention center parking lot
edible entrance
Figure 4.36 - Edible Entrance suitable for pedestrians and farmers market vehicles
86
The edible entrance forms the western gate to the site and takes on the footprint
of its former steel factory. People will pass through a metal canopy similar to the form
of the stage in the plaza. The presence of food growth is immediately apparent, as food
is grown on the ground, in planters, pots, and climbing the support structure. Figures
4.35 and 4.36 reveal a dramatic change in the view as one enters this side of the site. The
passage way will be wide enough to accommodate pickup trucks and cars to access Emily
Street for the Friday night market, which will be discussed later in the proposal.
The hop house is one structure remembering the many smoke stacks rising from
its former building, shown in Figure 4.37. The hop house, shown in Figure 4.40, will
host climbing vines rising up above the Market Street Bridge, producing some of the
hops needed to make the Republic of Beer’s finest brews – Grow Youngstown’s own
Figure 4.37 - Republic Steel - Arrow points of form of building the hop house emulates
Source: http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~classicpostcards/Parent%20Directory/usa/ohio/mahoning/mahoning.htm
distinct product. At harvest time, staff will climb up inside the vine tower to hand pick
hops, as shown in Figure 4.38. Not only does the hop house provide visual interest to
87
Figure 4.38 - Current view toward downtown in background
Figure 4.39 - Staff worker picking hops from
inside the hop house’s vertical tower
Hop House
Festival Lawn
Downtown
Figure 4.40 - Proposed Hop House stands adjacent to the festival lawn
88
the landscape, but also a proper sense of history by sharing similar form of the factory
structure that once stood in its place.
The chicken coop will operate
as a humane and organic producer of
chickens. Chickens will roam freely
within the coop, unless otherwise able
to roam the site to pick bugs from crop
and worms and bugs from the soil. An
egg cracking demonstration will show
visitors the difference between an egg
from a free range organically raised
Figure 4.41 - Chicken Factory - Grow Youngstown will allow chickens
to roam freely, as opposed to confinement, limited space, and unhealthy
living conditions chicken experience above. Source: HB Lanarc
bird, and constrained by the suffocating
conditions of a chicken sweat shop, as in Figure 4.41. Grow Youngstown will promote
healthy lifestyles for its livestock.
The hanging garden provides a destination for those seeking a quieter space to
interact with food and its aesthetic nature. As Figure 4.42 shows, both hanging and static
potted plant material adorns the large pergola. The hanging garden is a comfortable
place, easy on the minds of visitors and staff alike, as orchard trees, and edible and floral
plant material surround the area.
The composting area on the east side of the site will collect organic waste
produced from on-site maintenance, such as weeds, tree limbs, and rotten crops. This
large demonstration area contains large waste piles, and reveals a step by step process of
composting. Visitors will participate in turning over compost piles to properly aerate and
promote organic decomposition. Signage and personal guidance from staff will provide
an understanding of the importance of waste recovery and the stress food and organic
89
90
Figure 4.42 - Hanging Garden is a edible sanctuary where farmers and visitors can enjoy a tranquil setting
Education Circle
Cover Crops
Raised Beds
Figure 4.43 - Learning Circles provide lecture spaces for food and agriculture educations to teach visitors and local youth about food.
waste have on landfills. This information and personal interaction with the composting
process is intended to inspire a citywide movement, beginning at homes to encourage
residents to grow a edible garden.
The educational trail stops between the composting areas are nodes of production
and agricultural learning. These learning circles, represented in Figure 4.43, will promote
specific areas of understanding behind the science of growing food, how to grow food at
home, and hands on learning experience of sewing a seed. After completing the outdoor
tour at the west composting area, the agriculture experience continues into the main
facility and through the hydroponic facilities,
before coming to the end of the tour.
A few important programmatic
elements not noted by the master plan or land
use plan are a food bank, community kitchen
(shown in Figure 4.44), and education
classrooms, which are a part of the main
Figure 4.44 - Community Kitchen
Source: HB Lanarc
91
facility. Office spaces are wedged into a section of the hydroponics facility, so Grow
Youngstown can to manage on site and remote operations. This area will also provide
related businesses, most notably restaurants and farmers, office space to manage their
businesses.
Site visitors will learn how food is prepared, preserved, and kept fresh before
making its voyage to dinner plates at the storage and processing centers in the main
facilities. This particular segment of the educational experience will provide a view of
the food system few people get to witness. It is widely understood that conventional
agricultural practices utilize numerous resources in fertilizers and pesticides to produce
the vast amounts of food found in supermarkets.
Grow Youngstown strives to create transparency between consumer and supplier,
and will allow full disclosure of how it produces, processes, and stores food for its
constituents. It will grow food organically, process food humanly and cleanly, and store
food in a manner that will preserve its integrity and not diminish the quality of nutrition
or taste - getting products to market, whether it is on site or to local grocers.
The transparency of the educational trail will create a bond between people
and the food they buy from Grow Youngstown’s marketplace, knowing local people
have the utmost care for their products – providing quality food and prospering health.
Grow Youngstown visitors will be able to take their new food knowledge to the Grow
Youngstown marketplace, ask questions and create a relationship with their grocer. The
marketplace will be laid out so people can meander through kiosks of produce as shown
in Figure 4.45. They can stop to talk to a local farmer selling beef raised a local farm.
A bakery will sell fresh pastries made of the berries grown in the berry patches behind
the facility. The Republic of Beer Store will provide the Friday night medicine needed
to wind down from a hectic week. One can take their six-pack to the back plaza, shown
92
Figure 4.45 - Marketplace hosts a wide variety of food sales of site products and those of local farmers and gardeners.
in Figure 4.46, and enjoy it with family and friends, before they attend the Emily Street
Market.
The Emily Street Market opposes many traditional farmers market structures, as
it operates on Friday evenings and advertised as a community event. The market is not
only about food. Artisans are invited to sell their crafts, and musicians are welcome to
sound their melodies to the crowds. This event is a new event inspiring new nightlife in
downtown Youngstown. The Emily Street Market will see vendors set up their booths,
tents or out of their rear ends of cars or pickup trucks, along the edge of Emily Street,
beneath the Market Street Bridge. As seen in Figures 4.47 and 4.48, the design for this
market transforms the feeling and presence beneath the bridge. The once suffocating
and barren transition the bridge creates between both sides of the site, becomes a
weekly social oasis by adorning the space with lights and a colorful ceiling with many
light fixtures to address the need for a comfortable human experience to neutralize the
unforgiving infrastructure above - inviting people into the vibrant space.
93
94
Figure 4.46 - Rear plaza is a connects people to the hydroponic house and the marketplace. On the way they can stop into the brew pub to sample the Republic of Beer.
Figure 4.47 - Current Conditions beneath Market Street Bridge
Figure 4.48 - The new look of the Emily Street Market - A Friday evening destination for good food, music, and art.
95
Design Summary
The food hub is the epicenter, the heartbeat, of the food precinct network. Grow
Youngstown’s design presents one scheme of a vision, which could render several
possibilities. This plan is grounded by a foundation of the site’s industrial past, while a
new future sprouts at the surface. The design reveals a place driven by the sustainable
food system and successfully implementing the design consideration laid out earlier in
the report. The elements driving the design and are embedded throughout the landscape
in the form of growing structures, cover crops, and people places. The educational
trail binds the site together by connecting a hierarchy of the production of fresh food to
individual spaces for people to learn about the history of past industry and get glimpse of
Youngstown’s bright sustainable food future.
96
Endnotes
1
Janine de la Salle and Kyle Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities: A handbook
for planners designers and government,” (HB Lanarc: Vancouver, BC, 2009), 16.
2
HB Lanarc, “Food Hubs & Precincts,” (Vancouver, BC, 2009), 1.
3
HB Lanarc, Agricultural Urbanism,
http://www.agriculturalurbanism.com/food_precincts.php, (Vancouver, BC, 2009).
4
Ibid.
5
HB Lanarc, Agricultural Urbanism,
http://www.agriculturalurbanism.com/facilities_activities.php, (Vancouver, BC,
2009).
6
HB Lanarc, “Food Hubs & Precincts,” 2.
7
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 17.
8
de la Salle and Barrett, “Sustainable Food Cities,” 18.
97
A Look into the Future
Conclusion and Recommendations
Youngstown is the food city of the future – an exemplary model for not only
shrinking cities, but also growing cities as they look to implement food solutions in
planning to feed growing populations.
This project sets the stage for Youngstown to mitigate the factors of a shrinking
city, becoming a model for cities to invest in food as a catalyst for revitalization. Food
production, preparation, and retail, reveal strength for reclaiming vacant land, making
land productive, initiating employment opportunities, and renewing the city’s identity.
Much like Detroit, Youngstown will no longer be recognized for the death of its industrial
past or its high crime rate, but its budding food identity, which provides new industry to
champion productive land and new employment opportunities.
Entrepreneurship
The designer believes food can become a major economic driver, or at least,
a new business model for Youngstown; and intends for this project to inspire Grow
Youngstown, the local organization, to take the reigns for the management of this project
and lead Youngstown into its new future as a sustainable food city. The organization has
a passion for local food and the potential to synergize the community by carrying out its
mission “to create a healthy, socially just, economically viable and interdependent local
food system.”1 The big picture of this management consideration is the opportunity for
Grow Youngstown to become the face of the city, establishing a viable business at the
98
downtown food hub, where people will recognize its presence during daily commutes.
The organization will have the knowledge to properly plan out satellite food precincts
to support the production operations for Grow Youngstown. The more food the city can
produce the greater its food sovereignty; thus, supporting a sustainable food network with
strong local economic, social, and environmental ties.
As entrepreneurs, Grow Youngstown may be able to influence many local grocers
and farmers to conduct business with the hub, perhaps becoming a regional cooperative
or its own CSA, selling shares to local residents with a return of fresh food year round.
There are many options in terms of a management structure. John Hantz, the Detriot
urban farm visionary, has a good point in that the land needs to be taxable and that food
can be profitable.
Take a moment to turn back to page 32 to view the vacant land use map. Now
consider the economic impact of tax delinquent vacant land around Youngstown. It
is unlikely the city is collecting tax revenue from these properties, as abandoned and
tax delinquent property is often taken over by the city government.2 The emphasis on
reinstating a taxable product would promote Youngstown’s economy and reestablish
viable land use.
As of 2000, 24.8% of Youngstown residents were living below the poverty level,3
which means people are looking for jobs and affordable healthy food. Toronto’s plan for
urban agriculture articulates the importance to regenerate vacant and contaminated land
through investment and job creation.4 Therefore, the more land Grow Youngstown can
put into production, the more people it will employ, the more food it will grow to feed
they city, and ideally the more money it will make through sales to directly to citizens,
food retailers, and restaurants.
It is recommended for Grow Youngstown to discuss funding and grant
99
opportunities to kick-start the growth and development of its vision. This project would
like to highlight and recommend the USDA’s, Community Food Project Competitive
Grants Program, which is described from an excerpt taken from a 2009 document:5
Community Food Projects are intended to take a comprehensive approach to
developing long-term solutions that ensure food security in communities by linking
the food production and processing sectors to community development, economic
opportunity, and environmental enhancement. Comprehensive solutions should focus
on: (i) improved access to high quality, affordable food among low-income households;
(ii) expanded economic opportunities for community residents through business and
economic development, improved employment opportunities, job training, youth
apprenticeship, school-to-work transition, and (iii) support for local food systems, from
urban gardening to local farms, that provide high quality fresh foods with minimal
adverse environmental impact.
Any solution proposed must tie into community identified food needs,
directly connect outcomes to goals and objectives, and substantially involve and/
or be generated by members of the low-income community, i.e. “community-based”
not just “community-placed.” Low-income people must be the participants and direct
beneficiaries of project activities and outcomes.
Project goals should integrate multiple objectives into their design. Proposed projects
should seek to address outcomes beyond a specific goal, such as increasing food produced
or available for a specific group. Goals and objectives should integrate economic, social,
and environmental impacts, such as job training, employment opportunities, small
business expansion, neighborhood revitalization, open space development, transportation
assistance, or other positive community outcomes.
Proposed projects should seek comprehensive and well-planned solutions to
100
problems across all levels of the food system, not only short-term, emergency food
relief. This point is emphasized because some previously submitted proposals expanded
applicant efforts in food relief and assistance or connected established or partially
established programs, such as community gardens and farmers’ markets, with little
evidence of strategic community planning and participation by low-income residents
and other stakeholders in the proposed project design. Proposals should emphasize a
food system and/or food security approach and show evidence of information sharing,
coalition building, and substantial outreach to and involvement of the community.
This project would seriously be considered for funding. This comprehensive
and well-planned solution for turning Youngstown into a sustainable food city would be
considered for funding. Kaufman and Bailkey even note that between the inception of
the Community Food Projects Competitive Grants Program in 1996, and 2000, at the
time of their study on entrepreneurial urban agriculture projects, twenty-one (30%) of
the 69 projects awarded funding obtained some aspects entrepreneurship.6 Despite the
fact the Community Food Projects website states grants are intended for private nonprofit entities,7 the program encourages Grow Youngstown’s quest for funding. Local
partnerships can also be explored, with the potential for all shareholders to influence
policy to shape the future of Grow Youngstown and its contribution and influence of local
food and outreach in Youngstown, Ohio.
Seek precedence
Grow Youngstown should review the Community Food Projects Competitive
Grants Program, and also Jerry Kaufman and Martin Bailkey’s (2000), “Farming Inside
Cities: Entrepreneurial Urban Agriculture in the United States.” Although the report is a
decade old, its principles and theories support entrepreneurship within urban agriculture
support the opportunity for Grow Youngstown to profit from their food efforts.
101
Moreover, Kaufman and Bailkey discuss successful entrepreneurial models in Chicago,
Philadelphia, and Boston: their history, location, funding methods, and their impact on
their respective communities. Furthermore, exploring city plans for urban agriculture,
such as Seattle’s P-Patch system, will help intensify the criteria and methods, to drive
decision-making and policy planning. Prior examples of success will provide impetus for
Grow Youngstown to render a successful model through supplementing their own vision
with reference with precedent models.
Food Assessment
Conduct a food assessment. A food assessment is a particiapatory process
examining a broad range of food systems issues, helping formulate an understanding
of the opportunities and gaps in the current food system.8 A food assessment engages
the community in several ways, notably involving a diversity of stakeholders from
government, public, private, and non-profit sectors. It recognizes food access through
mapping - a technique to visually analyze physical food infrastructure and outlets,
and their relationships to consumers.9 Ultimately, a food assessment will enlighten
Youngstown on the efficiency of its food system, and provide impetus to drive policy and
planning iniatives on becoming a sustainable food city.
102
Figure 5.1 - Community Food Assessment Diagram - A diversity of people and organizations can initiate the assessment
process, invoking a variety of strategies for change. Source: Pothuckuchi10
103
Food Policy
Finally, Youngstown should consider initiating a food policy council. This
volunteer group of advisors helps promote policy and food planning initiatives fostering
sustainable a sustainable food system: organic agriculture, nutrition, equitable food
distribution and food consumption, and environmental health.11 Vancouver’s food policy
council is made up of food enthusiasts, chefs, planners, gardeners, farmers, and waste
managers.12 A food policy council will also help construct a food charter, which states
the its initiatives and vision for food in their city. Vancouver’s mayor and city council
accepted the food charter proposed by the Vancouver Food Policy Council on February
17, 2008, to serve as a benchmark for the role of food in urban areas, and its commitment
to food security, food education, and a sustainable thinking.13 The document serves
as the vision, which will drive future initiative and policy recommendations to local
government.
Final Remarks
The commentary on Grow Youngstown’s potential will continue well after the
conclusion of this project – or so the designer wishes. This project has set the table
for community organizers, local government, city planners, and other visionaries, to
consider the opportunity for food to reshape Youngstown’s landscape. The success of
cities’ futures will be dictated by innovative solutions intended to support citizens in
creating a sustainably high quality of life. Urban agriculture is a part of the discussion,
and food precincts will soon join in. Like it did after publishing the Youngstown 2010
Citywide Plan, Youngstown will present another innovative planning and design model
to the country and the world. One exemplifying the successful role of food in sustainably
revitalizing the city.
104
Endnotes
1
Grow Youngstown, http://www.growyoungstown.org/index.html, 2006.
2
Jerry Kaufman and Martin Bailkey, “Farming Inside Cities: Entrepreneurial Urban Agriculture in the United States,” Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, 2000, 4.
3
Census 2000.
4
Gerda R. Wekerle, “Toronto’s official plan for urban agriculture,” presentation to the Toronto Food Policy Council, June 18, 2002, retrieved from
http://www.cityfarmer.org/torontoplan.html, March 3, 2010, 3.
5
USDA, “Community Food Project Competitive Grants Program,” 2009, 7.
6
Kaufman and Bailkey, Entrepreneurial UA, 10.
7
USDA: National Institute for Food and Agriculture, “Community Food Projects,” http://www.nifa.usda.gov/funding/cfp/cfp_synopsis.html, March 18, 2009.
8
Provencial Health and Services Authority, “Community food assesment guide,” prepared by Sue Ross and Zena Simces.
9
Kamishwari Pothukuchi, “Community Food Assesment: A First Step in Planning for Community Food Security,” Journal of Planning Education and Research, Sage 23:4, 370.
10
Pothukuchi, Community Food Assessment, 361.
11
Vancouver Food Policy Council, “Our Goals,”
http://www.vancouverfoodpolicycouncil.ca/our-goals, 2008.
12
Vancouver Food Policy Council, “About Us,”
http://www.vancouverfoodpolicycouncil.ca/our-goals, 2008.
13
City of Vancouver, “Social planning, food policy, Vancouver Food Charter,” http://vancouver.ca/commsvcs/socialplanning/initiatives/foodpolicypolicy/charter.
htm, June 12, 2009.
105
Glossary of Terms
Biochar - Biochar is charcoal that is used for agricultural purposes. Biochar is created by
heating biomass in a low oxygen environment. Once organic matter is heated, the process
is self-sustaining, requiring no outside energy input. Benefits of biochar include, soil
moisture retention and fertility improvement in poor soils. 1
Culturally appropriate food – food that supports eating and cooking practices of specific
cultures and ethnicities
Food desert – a city district lacking access to food, forcing residents to have to drive or
travel great distances to access food
Food oasis – a city district with multiple food outlets (grocers, restaurants, food banks)
for people to access
Food precinct – a centrally located (in a city, district, or neighborhood) food center
structured around the principles of a sustainable food system.
Peri-urban agriculture – agriculture practices occurring on the perimeter of a city
Phytoremediation – the use of vegetation to treat contaminated soils2
Productive land – active agricultural land producing food crops or livestock
Organic agriculture – agricultural practices that eliminate any harmful substances or
methods that would deplete the health of the environment or the quality of food.
Sustainable food city – A town/city exercising practices that engage the sustainable food
system
Urban agriculture – agricultural practices occurring with urban areas
Waste recovery – the collection and the recycling of organic waste
Endnotes
1
Biochar, “Biochar overview,”
http://www.biochar.info/biochar.biochar-overview.cfml,
2
Jerald L. Schnoor, et al., “Phytoremediation of Organic and Nutrient Contaminants,” Environmental Science & Technology, 29,7, 318-323, American Chemical Society, 1995, 318.
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