$4.7 Million Urban Agriculture Education Center Planned For Vacant City Lot Receives St. Louis City and Neighborhood Approvals
UIC worked with engineers, landscape architects, and aquaponics systems designers to create a building that is as energy efficient as possible
By Craig Workman
St. Louis Post-Dispatch
Feb 12, 2024
Excerpt:
The 9,000 square foot Education Center will be a hub for hands-on experiences in bio-science, urban agriculture and nutrition/dietetics featuring classrooms, a greenhouse with aquaponic growing, sprout cultivation, and food processing. Supporting those spaces will be a multi-purpose gallery, volunteer space, audio-visual processing center, and offices. The exterior spaces include a roof terrace and “back yard” for different types of food growing, as well as a rain garden, sensory garden, and composting area. It will also feature advanced communication technology to allow programming to be streamed to schools around the region and beyond.
Principal project architect UIC has worked with the Green House Venture Board and committees over the past two years to complete the approval process for building the Education Center, having obtained zoning and other approvals from The City of St. Louis. The Board of Adjustment agreed to consolidate the properties into one lot, the Board of Public Service agreed to grant the conditional use for the property, and the design was approved as part of the Shaw Historic District by the Preservation Board, as well as the Tower Grove Neighborhood Community Corporation and Shaw Neighborhood Improvement Association.
