Roger's Park Garden Goals...
I'm a former resident of Rogers Park. I lived there for nine years. When I was younger it felt like home and such a healthy environment. Roaming aroung the neighborhood I would catch myself spotting a nice piece of greenary. All my neighbors had healthy plants in their gardens, and every morning I would catch the land-lord spraying the flowers in front of our building. It made the area have a sense of life and innocence. Yet, they're many backyard gardens than rooftops. The only rooftop garden that I know of in that area is the garden on the rooftop of the Rogers Park Church. Another place I would love to see a rooftop garden, is at the Fresh Morse Market. I feel that a rooftop should be here also because I always viewed this grocery store as an image that represents the Rogers Park area. Many people view the backyard gardening as "...a way to connect with nature in the city." Let's GO Chicago and former Rogers Park residents have really created ways to really support urban gardening in the community. Having kids and young teens participate as well. Getting closer to their goal of making organically grown food to be America's mainstay.

Some Rooftop Garden/Farmers' Markets guides:

If anyone is interested in checking out some more information on urban gardening and farmer's markets across the city (or to see how far the idea has spread nationwide), you can check out a few of these blogs that I found:

--Here's the official blog of the rooftop we visited at Weiss Memorial Hospital last Thursday 6/28/12.

-- Neighborhoods around the city are getting into the spirit of urban farming. Rogers Park, where I live has several small rooftop gardens, "ground" gardens, and farmer's markets. Here's information about people trying to develop more gardens in the Rogers Park area

-- This one is a favorite, as it is Rick Bayless's rooftop garden for Frontera Grill. If you haven't been to one of his restaurants in downtown Chicago, you may have seen his show on WTTW called Mexico One Plate at a Time. Frontera isn't the only restaurant doing this. If you're interested, check out Uncommon Ground's rooftop garden!

photo from http://www.wickedtastyharvest.com/

There's lots to be discovered about this topic in Chicago, and I hope that you'll all take a look at it some more. I think it's really interesting that this idea of urban gardening is so popular but not talked about as mainstream as it could be. Any ideas about why that might be? Can't wait to hear your thoughts and comments! :)

Peace,

C.