A new community farm is coming to West Philly. A groundbreaking ceremony for the Community Farm and Food Resource Center at Bartram’s Garden (54th St. & Lindbergh Blvd.) is taking place today at 4 p.m. Community members are invited.

This project has come to life thanks to the University of Pennsylvania’s Agatston Urban Nutrition Initiative with the help of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society , which is providing seedlings, resources and supplies to growers. Donations from the City and other organizations also made it possible.

The new farm is going to increase the community’s access to local, organic, and affordable food.  The goal of this project is to provide a space for everyone to develop a relationship with the land.

Bartram High School students will be hired to plant, grow, harvest and sell the produce. Plans are that by next growing season, the 3.5-acre farm and resource center will have a crop field where the students will raise annual vegetables. There will also be a community garden with individual plots tended by residents, an orchard of 50 fruit trees, a 1,000-foot-long perennial berry patch and a new greenhouse to start organic seedlings.

Future plans for the farm and resource center include replacing a gravel parking lot with a food-education center, complete with a kitchen, a classroom space and a packing shed/walk-in cooler/wash station for pre-sale vegetable preparation.