Thanks to one church group, the property will soon be transformed into a community garden that may one day feed the neighborhood.
Today about 30 kids from Bucks County dug down deep to turn this large vacant West Philadelphia lot into an urban farm. It will be major transformation for a place long associated with nothing good.
Skip Weiner of the Urban Tree Connection said, "Oh my God. This was previously a chop shop. A lot of nighttime activity. It was just horrendous."
Over the coming week, the volunteers will pull weeds, create raised beds, and then put in nature's bounty, like juicy tomatoes, tasty string beans, and fat squash. The hope is that within five years as many as 300 families will count on this harvest to counteract the lack of fresh, affordable produce in this low-income area.
"I think on Friday it'll just be so different," said volunteer Francesca Crimi. "Everyone will be so happy and proud of us, that we achieved this."
Not only will the people from the neighborhood have somewhere to get fresh vegetables, 20 neighborhood kids will be getting jobs this summer maintaining the new farm.
The kids are part of Mission Philadelphia; a service group from Trinity Episcopal Church is Solebury. Since the early 1990s, a week of service in West Philadelphia and bonding between these two very different communities has been a rite of summer.
"Just yesterday we worshipped at the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas, which we do every year as part of this," said Kyle Evans of Mission Philadelphia, "and one of our young people preached about the power of that connection for them."
Indeed, Timothy Silberg, now 23, has been doing this since he was 12. He says all the good done and good friends he would have otherwise never met from West Philadelphia explain his special summer mantra.
"Each summer, show up, remodel a park, feel good, come back home," Silberg said.
Now that's an attitude well planted and richly abundant.
