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Entries in Food (13)

Saturday
Apr242010

New Urban Roswell Update

DateSaturday, April 24, 2010 at 07:06PM

 

We found more than a few news items of note over the past couple of weeks from Roswell, around town and even outside the country.

Roswell

Roswell to Begin State Road 9 Improvements - AJC

The project has begun. We noticed the big orange barrels on our commute to work yesterday and we are excited to see the work begin. The work will progress in quarter mile increments and will begin at Norcross Street. This will really help change the face of the Roswell midtown area.

Legislature Passes Transportation Bill - ABC

This wasn't my favorite solution but it is a step in the right direction. MARTA will probably still have to make cuts this summer and we won't see any actual projects completed using the potential penny sales tax until 2014.

Sales of Foreclosures in North Fulton Increase: So What? - Live in Alpharetta

I'm not sure that I wholly agree with this post but I do agree that home prices in North Fulton are unlikely to see a wholesale decrease in values. The data is still deeply concerning and does not give any indication to me at least that the credit crisis is letting up. As the stimulus money begins to run out this quarter, I expect to see a dip back into recession territory. Also, the fact that Georgia was the sixth worst state came as no surprise but is disconcerting nonetheless.

Harry's Finds More Fresh Produce - NorthFulton.com

Harry's is now the drop off point for the Dunwoody Green Market CSA. We now have two CSA dropoffs here in Roswell with the other being the Local Food Stop dropoff at Market Street Antiques and Unitarian Universalist Church on Wed and Thurs respectively.

Roswell, Alpharetta Going Green - NorthFulton.com

This is a great article on Roswell and Alpharetta's green efforts. With Roswell being the only city in the state (to date) to achieve a Silver rating for the ARC's Green Communities initiative, it is obvious that the city is doing many things right. From parks, trails, water management, community outreach, tree protection and recycling, the city has really done a lot of good.

Metro

Big Creek Greenway Gets $1.5M Extension

This is great news for the big creek greenway. It will be incredible when it connects to the Forsyth portion. Now, let's see what the plan is for Roswell to extend the greenway further south.

Atlanta Receives Earth Day Brownfields Award from EPA to Support Beltline in Atlanta - EPA


This was a great announcement. Especially given the lack of funds that Atlanta or the state received from the stimulus package. There are 950 brownfield properties within Atlanta and 136 of those are along the Beltline.

 

Transit Cuts are Protested in Atlanta - NY Times

I thought it would be nice to get a little outside perspective on this. A third of the MARTA of buses and trains have had big red X's painted over them to signify that those are buses or trains that will be cut soon. We can only hope that cuts can be avoided. Unfortunately, it doesn't look that way. This article is rather pointed and doesn't mince words.

Reporter Asks "What Crosswalk?" - PEDS

I couldn't agree more with PEDS on this one. They wanted to point out that all too often, pedestrians are found at fault in traffic incidents while the bigger question of why did the pedestrian feel that they needed to act in an unsafe manner goes unanswered. Kudos to this reporter and to PEDS for posting this.

City Hall East Property Has New Suitor - ABC

Now that the beltline park in the fourth ward is underway, this purchase was bound to happen. The building should make an awesome mixed use office/residential complex if done right. There is a lot of potential here and I'm excited to see what it will become.

Compost Bins, Rain Barrels to be Distributed in Alpharetta - AJC

Unfortunately, I don't need these right now. The city will be selling Earth Machine backyard compost bins. Bins and rain barrels will be sold for $45 and $55 on a first-come-first-served basis.

Beyond

Would Streetcars in DC Spoil the City's Vistas - Washington Post

I completely agree that overhead wires look bad. I hate utility wires of all kinds. The technology does exist to make streetcars run without those ugly overhead wires. I just hope they aren't making perfect the enemy of good here. Streetcars definitely have a place and serve a great purpose.

New CDC Report Tells How to Design Communities to Support Good Health - PR-USA.net

The report in discussion works to illustrate the need to consider physical activity, respiratory and mental health, water quality, social equity and healthy aging when designing communities and the built environment. The CDC is looking to bring different diciplines together to work together to design the built environment in a more effective manner.

Upcoming Events

Congress for the New Urbanism - 5.19 - 5.22 - The most influential minds in the new urbanist movement will be here in Atlanta for the 18th congress. The theme this year is Rx for Healthy Places and is a joint effort with the CDC.

Go Wild in Roswell - 5.20 - 6.6 - This is a citywide celebration of nature that will feature different events on different days. Check out the link for details.

Atlanta Streets Alive - 5.23 - This one is still a little while away but it is a really interesting concept.

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Tuesday
Jul072009

Peach Bites

DateTuesday, July 7, 2009 at 08:06PM


McMansions Out of Favor, for Now - WSJ.com

When they get cheap enough, do you think they will be in favor again? I hope this is a sustainable trend but I'm not 100% convinced yet.

Organic Box Program @ Emory - in Decatur
Emory has started the Emory Organic Box Program to help connect farm-fresh produce, local, sustainable farms and the Emory Community. Those Emory Students don't realize how good they have it.

Suniva lands Fairburn project - Atlanta Business Chronicle - Atlanta Business Chronicle

Norcross based Suniva will supply solar cells to Woodbridge at Parkway Village an independent senior living facility. This is great for Georgia since Woodbridge will be the first Georgia location to have an all Georgia solar installation.

Go Green Intown: ICS Contract Services' Cleaning Service is the Southeast's First Green Seal Program - Go Green Intown

Why aren't more businesses and cleaning companies jumping on this wagon? I guess it's an awareness thing because I have a difficult time just getting my maid to use green products. But, she is gradually opening up and recognizing that they do just as good of a job.

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Thursday
Jun112009

Peach Bites

DateThursday, June 11, 2009 at 11:31PM


Georgia watering restrictions lifted - Atlanta Business Chronicle

We'll go with the good news first. The drought is over and the state is beginning to lift restrictions on watering. Now the bad news. Most people are going to go right back to their old habits and continue dumping valuable drinking water on their chemical saturated lawns. There are better ways.

Hardiness Zone Changes at arborday.org - ArborDay.org

If you're on the fence about global warming, here's a little bit of info that will stick in the back of your head. The changes from 1990 to 2006 are pretty impressive. I guess things are looking good for Georgia agriculture.

Video Tour of the Alpharetta Community Garden - Sustainable Alpharetta

We love to see these little signs of sustainability pop up. The 30 plots sold out quickly.


Taxing the Rain: Speaker Richardson Needs to Pay Attention to This - Peach Pundit

Hmmm... Municipalities need money.. Property tax revenues are falling.. So, what to tax... How about the Rain?

Tesla Motors to Open 7 New Stores in Major Cities - TreeHugger

This comes as no surprise but Atlanta isn't one of the lucky 7 cities to get the first Tesla Motors stores. The US Cities are New York, Seattle and Chicago.

 

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Friday
Jun052009

Peach Bites

DateFriday, June 5, 2009 at 06:34PM

 

HOV lanes switching to toll lanes on I-85

NorthFulton.com - I guess Money talks. I wonder how much this will actually help congestion. If you don't want to pay the 'tax,' you can still use the lanes if you have 3 or more people in your vehicle.

EPA Gives BeltLine $1M for Cleanup (2009-06-02)

WABE - Wow!! There are over 100 brownfield areas along the Beltline corridor that are still in need of cleanup. Hopefully, this $1 million can stretch a long way.

Proposed Coal Plant Loses Support

GPB News - Good to hear that four energy suppliers have lost interest in the proposed coal power plant in Douglasville. This leaves only six remaining companies backing the proposed plant.

Greenpeace places Publix last for seafood sustainability

Atlanta Business Chronicle - Not a very good score for one of the largest grocers in the metro area. The highest rated company was Whole Foods but they only scored a 4 out of 10.

The Buckhead Blog: Streets of Buckhead Delays Opening to Fall 2010

The Buckhead Blog - Unfortunately, we're going to have to wait a little longer to see how the old Buckhead Village evolves into its next incarnation. The project is seeking LEED certification and should be another great addition to the Atlanta scene.

 

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Monday
May182009

Sites You Should Know - Local Harvest

DateMonday, May 18, 2009 at 11:38PM

Every week GreenPeaches brings you a very useful site that you can use to help green your lifestyle.  Our picks may or may not relate directly to Atlanta but they will always be useful tools in greening our lifestyles.  We hope that you add these to your bookmarks and visit them in the future. 

Since this is our first installment, the pressure is on to pick a good site.  We have been looking at a number of food related sites recently because summer is here and the farmer's markets are in full swing.  One of the greenest things any of us can do is to change our diet.  Moving from a diet rich in meat and highly processed foods to one with fewer servings of meat and more whole foods, fruits and veggies is one of the most environmentally friendly changes one can make.

This week's pick can help you do just that.  Local Harvest is a non-profit organization that specializes in helping people locate local, healthy food in their area.  We love this website because it is simple to use and provides a wealth of information.  You can locate farmer's markets, restaurants, grocery stores, health food stores, CSAs and much more near you by entering the city or zip code you are looking for.  Just searching in my area here in Alpharetta, the site returns 12 farms (some of which are CSAs), 5 CSAs, 10 farmer's markets and 3 restaurants.  Each search result has details and the Local Harvest community rates them.

Stay tuned for our next Site You Should Know.

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Sunday
May102009

Movie Review - The Future of Food

DateSunday, May 10, 2009 at 09:26PM

If you’re not concerned about how your food is produced, then you might want to check out this film. At times, it is a little difficult to get through. The narrator sometimes comes off as a freshman film major reading from a script and the graphics leave a little to be desired. However, what the film lacks in pizzazz, it makes up for in content. Below are just some of the topics and questions that are covered in the movie:

  • Farmers are stretched to the brink and they are effectively laundering money in the form of subsidies directly from the federal government to the few remaining multinational companies that control our food supply.
  • Corporate interference is creating modern day feudalisim.
  • Genetically modified food is infiltrating non-genetically modified seeds and creating a dangerous experiment with our food.
  • Monsanto just doesn’t seem to have any conscience. Watch the movie and tell me if you disagree.
  • Can you patent life that can replicate and is out of your control after the first generation? Who is responsible when the “patented” life form infiltrates another farmer’s crops? Apparently, the farmer is now infringing on the patent. Wow!

Because of these issues and many others such as unbridled pesticide use, my family chooses to vote with our wallet and buy as many organic and local products as possible. However, these issues scare me immensely and I have never gone away from a film feeling more disturbed about the state of our nation and the potential problems that could very easily arise from our current agricultural system.

You should have hope though. The organic market has risen from only a couple billion dollars in the mid 90’s to over $24.6 billion in 2008 which was a 17% increase over 2007 (food increased 5.8%). We have some great groups right here in our backyard as well. Georgia Organics is one of the largest grassroots organizations of its kind in the nation. According to the Atlanta Community Food Bank, Atlanta has over 150 community gardens. There are many farmer’s markets and most grocery stores have an expanding health food and organic section. When you can, you should vote with your wallet.

Resources

The Future of Food

Georgia Organics

Oakhurst Community Garden

Farmer D Organics

Local Harvest

 

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Wednesday
Apr292009

PeachBites

DateWednesday, April 29, 2009 at 08:52PM

EPD Says Air Will Be Cleaner When New Coal Plant is Built

GPB News

"The state's top environmental regulator for air pollution says the air in eastern Georgia will be cleaner if and when a coal plant is built near Sandersville in Washington County." This must be one of those new "clean coal" plantsl.

Georgia Organics 12th Conference: A Success

Go Green InTown
Unfortunately, I missed this one. Hopefully I'll be able to get to next year's conference. The conference and trade show had over 1100 attendees and was the largest in the 12 years of the event. Michael Pollan, author of The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food, was the keynote speaker. You can see his speech here. If you have never heard or read Mr. Pollan and you are interested in sustainable and healthy food, check out the clip or read one of his books. It was great that Georgia Organics was able to bring such a big time name to the event. We are fortunate to have such an organized group right here in Georgia focusing on local and organic food production.

Old Suburbia Must Fit Into New Society

 

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

"Our love affair with shopping is on the skids. Ghost-town strip centers already abound. It’s not hard to imagine dead malls pocking the landscape like buffalo carcasses amid the tumbleweeds in old Westerns." Ellen Dunham-Jones' book Retrofitting Suburbia details a recreation of the suburbs or "new suburbia." She says that metro Atlanta is one of the top three metro areas undertaking suburban retrofits with projects such as Smyrna Market Village and Perimiter Place in Dunwoody. It's good to see that Atlanta is finally starting to get it. Unfortunately, we got it right at the wrong time for real estate.

 


Toxic Cloud in Forsyth County Disipates

GPB News

This one was scary. Authorities recently had to evacuate 80 people from a kitchen and bathroom faucet manufacturing plant. The cause of the yellow puff of toxic smoke was an inadvertent chemical mix.

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Sunday
Apr122009

City Sustainability Rankings from SustainLane

DateSunday, April 12, 2009 at 10:50PM

It's very useful to compare yourself against others to determine where you need to improve. Knowing where our city stands on a number of sustainability and environmental issues would be very useful. SustainLane does just that for the top 50 metro areas in the U.S. They rank cities based on 16 environmental criteria and then assign an overall ranking. Atlanta was the most improved city from 2007 to 2008 moving up from number 38 to number 19. That's a nice move. Our bright spots on the report are Green Building, where we are #3 overall, Transit Ridership and Local Food. Our low spots are congestion, air quality and planning/land use.

Check out the chart to see how Atlanta ranked on all of the criteria.



Source: SustainLane.com

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Sunday
Mar222009

iPhone Apps for GreenPeaches

DateSunday, March 22, 2009 at 08:18PM

Now, we totally understand if you don’t own an iPhone so we apologize in advance that this post is not dedicated to you. However, if you do, you will already know that it's not the iPhone that sets you apart, it's the apps you have on the iPhone.  We have been looking high and low for apps that can help you be green in Atlanta. Although there aren’t too many out there that are solely dedicated to green topics, there are a lot that really help even if they don’t know it. Here are four that we found that are either great in their current form or could be great with a little bit of work.

Seafood Watch from the Monterrey Bay Aquarium

This app makes eating seafood for the eco-conscious much easier. The app is the online version of their printable wallet card and is much more in-depth. It divides the country up into regions and has an alphabetized list of seafood in that area. It uses the following three classifications; Best Choice, Good Alternative and Avoid. When you view a specific type of fish, it will give you a brief reason for the rating then it will go into a consumer note followed by a summary. An added plus is that you get a picture of the fish so the app almost doubles as a field guide.

ATL Traffic

Unfortunately, it is almost impossible to avoid it. So, the best thing you can do is know where it is and how long it’s going to keep you from where you want to go. The app taps you into the traffic cameras for all of the local freeways and streets (that have cams). You also can pipe into the road signs and see all of the local traffic alerts. This one is a must when you are on the road a lot. It will definitely help you avoid sitting helplessly in some traffic jams. We know, some of them are just going to be unavoidable.

Green Guide


We’re not too sure about this one yet but it is a great concept. The green guide takes consumer reviews and ranks thousands of consumer products on their environmental merits. Right now, they focus on Toys, Personal Care and Household Cleaners. They have ratings for over 60,000 products. The idea is great but I don’t know that the rankings are accurate. As an example, when comparing the top 5 Deodorants & Antiperspirants on the Green Guide to their respective rankings on the Environmental Working Group’s Cosmetics Database (www.cosmeticsdatabase.org) we found TK that ranked in the Lower TK percent. The idea is great but the jury is still out on this one. It will keep you away from really bad products though.

Maps

 

The maps app comes standard with the iPhone and is a lifesaver. It is pretty normal as far as map functions go and it interfaces with Google Maps. What makes maps green is the fact that you can save gas and time by finding the best route before ever getting into your car. It has saved us on many occasions. The app also will pipe into Google’s transit and walking directions databases if you prefer to use those modes instead of driving.

 

Here are some others that might be worth checking out:

Carbon Footprint

GreenMeterp

pConsumpt

MeterRead

Get Green

ShopGreen

Green You

Growing Up Green

Green Lemur

iLocovore

Gas Buddy

iGreen

Recycler

 

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Monday
Feb092009

This Week in Atlanta - 2/09/2009

DateMonday, February 9, 2009 at 11:07PM

Here are just a few events in town this week. Check on our calendar for more details.

 

Tue Feb 10   1pm – 2pm City of Alpharetta - Composting Workshop - 13450 Cogburn Road, Alpharetta, GA
Sat Feb 14   6pm – 10pm Lusting for Local Food - Georgia Organics - The Gardens at Kennesaw
Sun Feb 15   2pm – 3:30pm Sweetwater Creek Visitor's Center Tour - Sweetwater Creek State Park

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