As more people shift away from driving, what do you do with all the unused parking space in downtown Vancouver? Convert it in to vertical farms, of course!

Next door to my work is an underused, 5-story parkade that is now home to a $2-million vertical farm. I’ve watched it being constructed over the past two months. Today it celebrated it’s first harvest, and it’s expected to produce 70,000 kg of vegetables every year – that’s a lot of kale and arugula.

It’s a fancy system built by Alterrus.

The facility will be 5,700 square feet, with 4,000 square feet devoted to growing the produce in trays, stacked 12 high and circulating on conveyer belts. The remaining 1,700 square feet will be used for picking and packaging. It will use less than 10 per cent of the water required for traditional field agriculture, while producing significantly higher yields compared to field-farmed produce. All of the excess water used will be recycled.

More details and some excellent photos are available at Vancouver Foodster.