Could We Feed Our City Off the Back 55?
As a UBC’er who lives in Richmond, I drive past the Garden City lands every time I‘m avoiding traffic on No. 3 Road. This 55 Hectare (136 Acre) field sits between the bustling development in Richmond’s city centre and the farming fields to the southeast. It’s a very large undeveloped green space in a city where dozens of condos regularly replace side-by-side bungalows. If you live in Richmond (and according to this report, 13% of you do), you should know that Garden City offers more then just a short-cut.
Prime Real Estate
Now when I say prime real estate, you probably think about condos, apartment complexes, and convention centers. The Garden City green space is prime real estate, that’s for sure. But what’s not certain is what this land will look like when Richmond’s building boom settles. Will we see condos and coffee shops? Will it live on as a field in fallow? Or will we watch as community gardens bloom?
What about the ALR?
The Garden City lands are in the ALR – or the Agricultural Land Reserve. Hmmm… my favorite traffic short cut is in the ALR. What the heck does that mean?
If your property is in the ALR, it means that it is subject to the Agricultural Land Commission Act which was established to preserve agricultural land for present and future generations and to encourage the establishment and maintenance of farms as a secure source of food.
Source: ALR website FAQs
Sounds great to me, I’d sure like my bike commute to be alongside my own local food source. As I understand it, because of this protection from the ALR, the owners of the Garden City lands can’t put up apartment towers. But wait a minute, how are we going to make sure that Garden city becomes a secure source of food to help feed Richmond? When I ride by, it looks like an empty field where not much is happening at all.
The Future of Garden City
As it turns out, there IS a lot happening behind the scenes with the Garden City lands in Richmond. The owners, who include the City of Richmond, the Musqueam Indian Band, and the Canada Lands Company, have tried once (unsuccessfully) to get this land out of the ALR. As this has unfolded, stories of building convention centers, high-density developments, farming the land, community consultations and arguments on city counsel have filled the local papers. Frankly, I’ve found the story really hard to follow. (You can do a search for “Garden City” at the Richmond News or Richmond Review if you want a to catch up on local news).
Yesterday, I read about an example of a sustainable way forward that I could get behind – the Sustainable Food Systems Centre proposal from the Richmond Poverty Response Committee. Check out this picture from the first page of the proposal:
Besides community farms and gardens, the proposal includes public trails, a community gathering place, a heritage orchard with apiary, a farmers’ market with organic produce and free-range eggs, and much more. The plan provides for tourism, urban-agriculture education, social support, and response to poverty, all with partner organizations. It builds on ongoing successes such as Richmond fruit tree sharing, Ian Lai’s Terra Nova Schoolyard Project, and the Richmond sharing farms, which supply the Richmond Food Bank with local produce.
Source: “Rays of hope for Garden City lands” an article by Jim Wright published on the Garden City lands blog (also published in the Richmond Review; this is the article that my family read over dinner table last night).
Richmond as a Garden City
Next time you drive by, have another look at those fields in the Garden City lands. Think of the value of this land not in terms of development $$$ but in terms of green space and farmland. With these lands, Richmond has the chance to truly become a “Garden City”. As for me, I’m going to start paying more attention to what’s happening with the Garden City lands. I hope that the way forward includes a sustainable solution that considers community gardening, local food production, and green space. What about you?
