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NEWS: CROP is moving forward. We're working with the City of Chicago and the architecture firm Altamanu to bring our first orchard to Logan Square. After our first public meeting in August, we held break-out sessions with interested neighbors. The city hosted a focus group of their own in November and we're hoping to host another public meeting yet this winter.
We've seen some of Altamanu's sketches for the sight and we'll share them as soon as they're available. They look amazing.
Chicago Rarities Orchard Project is a non-profit organization founded to establish community rare-fruit orchards in Chicago. These orchards, designed for reclaimed spaces, are dedicated to preserving a few of the thousands of varieties of tree fruit that aren't commonly commercially grown, while providing open space and educational opportunities to Chicagoans.
It'll still be a long time before we're all sitting in the shade, eating apples. In the meantime, we've been working closely with NeighborSpace, the City of Chicago's Department of Zoning and Land Use to acquire our first orchard site.
Here's a rough sketch of what we have in mind:
Our design is intended to balance accessibility, careful management, and beautiful garden design. An open landscaped plaza along Logan Boulevard activates the intersection of Logan and Milwaukee. Continuing along Milwaukee, a community managed orchard will be open to the public during volunteer hours throughout the week, through public special events, and programmed in coordination with the Farmer’s Market.
For more information on what we've been thinking about, please see our information sheet about this site (pdf).
What's Happening 2010 was a remarkable year for CROP. Here's a quick and dirty round-up of CROP''s activities in 2010:
* January - Launched the Agropolitan cocktail at Uncommon Ground; sales support CROP * February - Officially partnered with NeighborSpace * April - Talked biodiversity at Columbia College''s Eco Fair * May - Grafted second round of trees, total saplings now over 60 * June - The Green Bike Tour gets a tour of CROP's proposed space * July - Logan Square Farmers'' Market and the Milwaukee Avenue Arts Festival host CROP, lot of great conversations! * August - Huge crowd at LSK for the community meeting where the city presented its proposal for a public plaza and CROP''s orchard * September - CROP initiated breakout meetings with folks who''s interest was piqued by the community meeting * October - Three board members represented CROP at Terra Madre (Slow Food International''s massive conference in Turin, Italy) * November - The Department of Zoning and Land Use hosted a focus group to get community input on the proposed plaza and orchard * December - CROP, the DZLU and Altamanu brainstormed designs for the lot, incorporating the suggestions of our neighbors
To keep up to date on what CROP's getting into, get on our mailing list! |
On January 26th, 
We are always looking for ideas, input, and partners. Get on our mailing list to keep up to date on what and how we're doing. Want to contribute to CROP? Click here.