26 Nov Urban Farming: The Future of Food & Real Estate

Urban Farming And Emerging Real Estate Trends

The truth is real estate became super interesting for me when I realized that it crossed over into my passion for good, natural food! I always said my heart was through my stomache and it still holds true today. Years ago, at the start of the major push to build endless condos, I had the crazy idea of integrating small urban gardens on rooftops. Well why not I thought, we put pools, gyms and sometimes skylights on roofs. Why couldn’t we have our own herb gardens, how wonderful would it be to go up on your roof and pick some fresh herbs for your dinner plate. Besides, we need a sustainable urban food system to grow alongside our traditional supermarkets and grocers. Lufa farms is unique and beautiful to behold as you see this 31,000 squrare foot greenhouse, or urban farm sitting on top of an industrial building. Since Lufa opened several years ago, there have been many new models of urban farms that require less space and set up, that are much less capital intensive. Everything from container farming to large scale vertical farming. Either way, vertical farming is an important part of our food systems of the future.

What will that mean for real estate? Maybe a new way of thinking about space. I thought I’d share an interesting video from the Urban Land Institute, titled “Food & Real Estate: Cutting Edge Trends”

Food and Real Estate: Cutting-Edge Trends

Filmed October 26 at the 2016 ULI Fall Meeting in Dallas, Texas. A focus on food is providing a rich arena for innovation that can improve outcomes for real estate business and practice, people, and the planet.

            Here’s the report on “Trends and Opportunities at the Intersection of Food and Real Estate” by the Urban Land Institute

For more information visit the Urban Land Institute