New Green Neighborhoods to Include Gardens, Farms
WEDNESDAY, MAY 9
Portland, OR
7 - 8 pm
Powells Books @ Cedar Hills Crossings
3415 SW Cedar Hills Boulevard
with Ecotrust Food and Farms
MAY 9, 2007--Local eating got a huge boost now that LEED, the benchmark of green building standards, is expanding to include entire neighborhoods. New developments will need to include both farms and community garden space to get the covetted gold rating. On-the-ground trials of the new guidelines began in February and will be completed in 2009 after a lengthy public comment period.
"If you want to be an urban planner, now you must know the food policy guidelines," says Lynn Peemoeller, program director of Sustain USA in Chicago, and a co-author of the new LEED neighborhood guidelines. This gives us hope that in future, suburbs will embrace rather than erase farmland. -ADS
