Healthy Cities Our cities program works alongside communities to grow equitable, nature-based solutions that aim to improve the health, well-being and quality of life for people and nature in the St. Louis region. We collaborate with anchor institutions, such as churches, schools and community- based organizations to co-create strategies and community-driven green infrastructure to address community concerns around stormwater, flooding, urban heat and air quality.
ON THE GROUND Greening St. Louis Churches The Jubilee Oasis Farm is a thriving farm in north St. Louis that helps feed a community experiencing inequitable food access, offers job training opportunities and collects rainwater from the church’s roof that might otherwise feed into harmful runoff entering the Mississippi River. Jubilee Community Church welcomed TNC as one of its community partners as it sought to install a 150,000-gallon rainwater- harvesting system through the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District’s Project Clear program. That system now irrigates an orchard and gardens, where members of the church and people from the surrounding Fairgrounds neighborhood grow food on what was a vacant lot. A portion of the harvest is sold at Local Harvest grocery store and to restaurants through Eat Here as a new generation of urban growers learn skills, such as farm production, water management and how to set up local markets.
WHAT’S TO COME Greening St. Louis Schoolyards
Working closely with the St. Louis Public Schools district and Dutchtown South Community Corporation, our cities program is partnering on a project to turn roughly three acres of asphalt into a park-like greenspace at Froebel Literacy Academy, an elementary school in south St. Louis’ Gravois Park neighborhood. More than a year of planning and input from students, school staff and neighbors will inform a design that aims to enhance students’ experiences with nature and enrich outdoor learning opportunities, while simultaneously tackling stormwater runoff and localized flooding challenges. The creation of the green schoolyard will not only transform Froebel’s playground but serve as a pilot with the potential for additional green schoolyards throughout St. Louis.
LEARN MORE about our Healthy Cities strategy at nature.org/mocities
THIS PAGE TOP Current playground at Froebel Literacy Academy © Kristy Stoyer/TNC BOTTOM Jubilee Oasis Farm’s rainwater-harvesting system being installed © Jubilee Community Church
10 MISSOURI: STRATEGIES & SOLUTIONS
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online