Two years ago some of the green-thumbed folks from Bushwick pizzeria Roberta’s launched a project called Brooklyn Grange, whose very first rooftop farm is actually in Queens and whose CSA is very affordable—the joke being that something so New Brooklyn-y, with Brooklyn in its name, could only find affordable rooftop real estate in Queens. Well, yesterday Brooklyn Grange announced on its Facebook page that they’ve just signed a lease for their second rooftop farm, this one at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
The Brooklyn Navy Yard building in question, one of its biggest and tallest, faces Flushing Avenue between Adelphi Street and Claremont Avenue and houses all manner of manufacturing, light industry, design and artists studios. Soon, it can add organic agricultural production to that list. In a message yesterday accompanying a photo of the rooftop space, Brooklyn Grange announced:
It’s official! We signed a lease with the Brooklyn Navy Yard and will be expanding to our second farm this spring.
The location offers over 45,000 square feet of growable space, just over an acre, more than doubling their land. Though the duration of the lease wasn’t mentioned—the Grange’s Long Island City farm has a 10-year lease—the lion’s share of the funding for the expansion was provided through the New York City Department of Environmental Protection’s Green Infrastructure Grant Program.
The new farm will be installed this spring, so when the weather gets warm they’ll be needing lots of volunteer farm hands…
Follow Benjamin Sutton on Twitter @LMagArt