'Guerrilla gardening' comes to Washington

Community gardens are proliferating in the nation's cities, and conspicuously in Washington, DC. 

• An organization known as Groundwork Anacostia River DC is organizing vegetable gardens on vacant and neglected lands in poor sections of the capital.

• An organization called City Blossoms is working with DC public school students to beautify city spaces and grow, harvest, andprepare vegetables. 

• The Common Good City Farm is teaching low-income residentshow to grow healthy food.

The most unconventional activity that's sprung up among Washington's gardening contingent, however, is "guerrilla gardening," The Washington Post reports. It involves throwing "seed bombs"—golf-ball-size lumps of mud packed with wildflower seeds, clay, and some compost and water—onto derelict lots, hoping that flowers will take root on these neglected expanses.

The Post says seed-bombing is part of a phenomenon "known as activist gardening that is taking off this spring in cities such as Portland, Detroit, Baltimore and the District." Participants view it as a tool for social change.

You can find out more about it—including descriptions of examples around the world—at a British-based website, Guerrilla Gardening.org.

For more in-depth coverage: 

• Subscribe to Better! Cities & Towns to read all of the articles (print+online) on implementation of greener, stronger, cities and towns.

• See the March 2012 issue of Better! Cities & Towns. Topics: Traffic congestion, Zoning, DOT mainstreams livability, HUD's Sustainable Communities, Transit-oriented development, TOD tips, Form-based codes, Parking minimums, New classical town, Urban retail, James H. Kunstler, Placemaking and job growth, Maryland's smart growth.

• See the January-February 2012 issue of Better! Cities & Towns. Topics: Value capture and transit, Social networks aid downtown, Live smaller, Rentals are market key, Streetcar inspiration, Box building, Civilizing suburbs, Alley houses, Sprawl repair, Healthy communities, Funding for infrastructure, Chicago River reversal.

• See the December 2011 issue of New Urban News. Wall Street and urbanism, streets to plazas, Sustainable Communities grants, Choice Neighborhoods, TIGER grants, buyers prefer smart growth, protecting historic buildings, public health and planning, redevelopment in Georgia, Ecovillages, parklets.