It's hot out there...

...so inside, as per NWS guidelines, it is. The garden is LOVING the heat, and we're looking good for next week.

Here are some interesting takes on Braddock, Pennsylvania, an urban offshoot of Pittsburgh on the north shore of the Monongahela River. In the wake of the collapse of the steel mills in industrial Pittsburgh and a serious "brain drain" on the population, Braddock was literallly left behind. What separates this urb from many like it in Western PA is that an organized movement of people, artists, urban farmers, students, young families, and all them yinzers who've always been there are joining together to bring Braddock back.

Levi's is helping to sponsor some of the redevelopment, and are documenting their progress here:
http://us.levi.com/shop/index.jsp?clickid=header_explore&categoryId=2929279&AB=CMS_Home_Portraits_070110

Orion Magazine also wrote a feature on some of the personalities pushing the progress ahead:
http://www.orionmagazine.org/index.php/articles/article/4938/

It's incredible to see not just the push for urban agriculture, and not just the motivation of artists and working-class families to make a place for themselves, but that all of these people are working, together and in whatever ways they individually can, to reinstate the integrity of the place. There's hope.