Duluth, MN: Broadway Market Community Garden

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PLANTING THE SEEDS OF COMMUNITY
BROADWAY:Gardens, an open-air market and the arts come together in  
Superior's North End.
BY SHELLEY  NELSON
NEWS TRIBUNE STAFF  WRITER
Volunteers are building a sense of  community in Superior's North End, one 
garden box at a time. 
The North End Arts Council envisions a place where neighbors, artists,  
musicians, performers and gardeners can gather outside and get to know each  other 
better. 
The Broadway Market would be that place. 
Located across the historic Trade and Commerce building -- the Old City Hall  
-- the market is taking shape in an unused parking lot at Broadway Street and 
 Hammond Avenue. 
"The whole goal is to do art enrichment for people in this neighborhood,"  
said Theresa Bobula, a facilitator and grant writer for the arts council.  
"Utilizing that building was just one of the things that was available to us to  
turn this empty parking lot into green space." 
During the next month, the arts council and volunteers will build garden  
boxes for flower and vegetable gardens. Members of the North End Arts Council  
were out Saturday finishing garden boxes that were started last fall with the  
help of the Boys and Girls Club in Superior. 
Flowers will fill the boxes next to Hammond and Broadway. Work has yet to  
begin on the vegetable beds that will run along the remaining edges of the  lot. 
"Our plan is that we're going to build those in the next month or so, and  
people can adopt them. They can do community garden for neighbors," Bobula said. 
 "Ideally, we'd love to have the seniors... and the kids in the  
neighborhood." 
Jim Postance of the Slow Food Convivium, which is working with the North End  
Arts Council on the project, said he hopes to see kids out selling their 
produce  and learning to save seeds. Postance also belongs to the Seed Savers 
Exchange,  which donated about $100 worth of seeds for the gardening project at 
Broadway  Market. 
"Our eventual goal is to put up a structure here, an open-air structure, to  
perhaps have a farmer's market, allow people to sell their art, to have music  
maybe at lunch or on a Friday night," Bobula said. Concerts would be held 
early  in the evening to avoid disturbing the neighborhood. 
The structure could include space for a year-round artisan bread shop. 
Margaret Karsky said she and her husband, Dale, are in the preliminary stages 
 of planning the new business that could open later this summer. Karsky said 
her  husband would run the shop, which would feature breads made with locally 
grown  ingredients. 
Broadway Market will work to complement the artist community and farmer's  
market currently in the Winter Street Depot, Bobula said. The advantage of the  
Broadway Market is its high-traffic, visible location, she said. 
"We need to view the arts as an economic generator for our areas," said Karin 
 Kraemer of Duluth Pottery in Superior. "It's already helping our 
neighborhood  here. It's a better neighborhood because we've been here. It's just 
amazing. 
"Besides, its fun," Kraemer said. "I want to have a good time, hang out with  
interesting, creative people. When you learn to do creative things, then you  
learn to approach the rest of your life in a creative manner. You 
problem-solve.  That's what art is about... solving problems." 

____________________________________
 SHELLEY NELSON can be reached at (218) 279-5501, (800)  456-8282 or by 
e-mail at snelson@ duluthnews.com. 

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