Hidden behind a steel door in an underground parking lot at Yonge and Davisville, a subterranean farm is spouting leafy greens, showing how under-used spaces can be transformed to provide fresh produce in the heart of the city. In what used to be a gloomy and grimy room for storage lockers filled with winter tires, bright LED lights now illuminate row upon row of hydroponic towers in a food-safe environment that produces 12,000 heads of lettuce per month — all destined for high-end restaurants, food banks and soon a local farmer's market.
"We want to localize the way our city feeds itself," said Ben Naster, co-founder of Civic Greens, which set up the farm 18 months ago. "We're not looking to replace traditional agriculture, just supplement it — especially in winter."
Instead of relying on imported lettuce from California during cold months, restaurants and grocery stores can now buy locally grown produce year-round from indoor farms. "With all the geopolitical turmoil that's going on, this provides resilience," Naster added.
Ceiling-mounted fans circulate the air clockwise around the 3,700 sq.-foot room, where seeds are sprouted in peat moss pods before they're transferred to the hydroponic towers to grow over a four-week harvest cycle. No pesticides are used. The towers — a technology developed decades ago by NASA for space, but perfected by Canadian cannabis growers over the last decade — use so little power and water that the entire farm didn't require any electrical or plumbing upgrades to set up.
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