Published by City Farmer, Canada's Office of Urban Agriculture

An Edible Public Park

Sustainable Solutions For The Urban Environment
Bountiful City Project

For more information, contact
Matt Ensner, City Seeds
828-215-4122.

or contact
Jim Orr, CPRP
Superintendent of Parks and Public Facilities
City of Asheville
P.O. Box 7148
Asheville, NC 28802
828/259-5805 November 17, 1998

The City of Asheville NC, has recently opened the nation's first intentional, edible public park! The Bountiful City Project, a public/private partnership between Asheville Parks & Recreation and City Seeds, a local non-profit organization, aims to bring edible public open-space back into the discipline of urban planning and design. The edible park produces multiple varieties of apples, peaches, pears, figs, mulberries, cherries, raspberries, blueberries, nuts, culinary and medicinal herbs.

The park was designed around Permaculture forest gardening principles. All vegetation within the park is both edible and perennial. With a projected development period of between 3-5 years, the park is hoped to become a low maintenance-high yield system, completely open to the public to enjoy.

Currently, the prototype is a 1 acre lot in downtown Asheville where, over the past year, City Seeds has been designing and building the park with the help of civic organizations, at-risk youth groups, middle school students, college students, and the general public.

City Seeds and the Asheville Parks & Recreation Department have chosen several sites within the city that more edible parks will be implemented.

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