Residents of W. 33^rd Street in the Brooklyn Centre neighborhood of Cleveland were tired of stolen cars, drug dealing and prostitution in the vacant lot at the end of their street.

At one time, a neat row of houses stood there, overlooking the picturesque Cleveland Metroparks Zoo. Then Norfolk Southern, the owner of the rail lines that traverse the valley below, bought the homes and tore them down to shore up the hillside. Needless to say, the residents liked their old neighbors better. In 15 years of absentee ownership, Norfolk Southern has done nothing to maintain or secure the property.

The residents decided to do something about it. The property was a little too big for a community garden, so they decided to plant an orchard instead.

"The clean-up effort was like waging guerilla warfare on an overgrown lot," Darren Hamm, one of the project's leaders, told the audience at last week's forum on vacant land reuse at Cleveland State University's Levin College of Urban Affairs. "We found toys, car bumpers and chunks of concrete underneath the soil."

"Everyone was really motivated to clean up this lot, so it wasn't hard to get volunteers," Hamm added.

After cleaning the land and preparing the soil, Hamm and other project leaders planted neat rows of fruit trees and bushes. Among those planted were pear, apple, cherry, peach, blackberry and raspberry. As a finishing touch, a white picket fence and welcoming arbor were added.

The community orchard project, which sits on Louisiana Avenue between W. 33rd and W. 34th streets, was aided by a $5,000 grant from Reimagining Cleveland, a small grant program supporting entrepreneurial efforts to repurpose vacant land in the city of Cleveland. Reimagining Cleveland is managed by Neighborhood Progress and funded by the Surdna Foundation and the City of Cleveland. 

This innovative program offered the residents more than just funding, however. At first, they couldn't find anyone at Norfolk Southern to talk to about leasing the property. Then a group in the Detroit Shoreway neighborhood that had been dealing with a similar problem found a sympathetic staff person at Norfolk Southern. Through the Reimagining Cleveland grantee network, they were able to share that information with the residents of W. 33rd Street .

"Now the person from Norfolk Southern is calling me and saying, 'OK, that was a good project, where else can we do this?'" said Lilah Zautner, Program Manager for Reimagining Cleveland. "That story shows the power of the network."

Source: Darren Hamm, Lilah Zautner
Writer: Lee Chilcote