What they're doing on the empty lot on Central across from Steele Indian School park - Agave Farms


As long as I can remember, Phoenix has had a LOT of empty lots. All over the place, and often in places that have made me wonder "why hasn't anything ever been built there?" Of course no one knows. (Update - Some people do know! See comment below! Thanks, JR!) So when I see some activity in a lot that's been empty for a long time, it gets my attention!

If you're like me, you've been driving past the empty lot on the west side of Central north of Glenrosa, which is the light just north of Indian School Road, for a LONG time. The Central Avenue entrance to Steel Indian School Park is right across from it. You know, the big empty lot with about a million little yellow posts in front of it. Yeah, that's the one.

Today, after doing some History Adventuring downtown, I stopped at Lux on Central Avenue for a decaf. I parked on Turney, and in an idle moment I wandered over to see what I could see because there was now a permanent fence where there had once been that empty lot, and flowers. Lots of flowers! I walked all of the way along Central to Glenrosa, trying to figure it out, and even now I'm not really sure what's going on there - but I'll tell you what I know.

It's called Agave Farms. And the business manager, who gave me his card (and I can't seem to find it just now) told me that they had been there for about a year. Today is December 10th, 2016, so obviously I haven't been paying attention. I bought two petunia plants and he showed me around, a little (I have a bad ankle so I can't wander too far!).

It's a big place, and from what I could see they have a lot of plants, including roses, trees, and veggies (there were a bunch of pumpkins out front). He told me that they offered classes on plants, and cooking, and in addition to helping the community, they were indeed a commercial business, and the land is privately owned. They're really just starting out, and my suggestion that he put up some signs was met with a sad smile about whether the city would let them do it or not. And the more I thought about it, the more I thought that a bunch of glitzy signs would just spoil the sincere feel of the place.

And it really does have a nice feeling. I like visiting places that sell plants, and nowadays mostly they're big corporations, and I'd kinda like to support something more, well, sincere.

If you visit, and are wondering what the shape on the ground is (in the photo), it's an agave in a heart. Right now they're still planting, so maybe by the time you get there it will be more filled in. It seems just right.

Thank you to my patrons on Patreon who help support History Adventuring! If you like these blog posts, and would like to make suggestions for future ones, please go to patreon.com/PhoenixHistoryAdventuring where you can show your support for as little as $1 a month. Thank you!

What Patreon is http://bradhallart.blogspot.com/2016/03/supporting-creators-on-web-with-patreon.html

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why cars in the future won't need stop signs, red lights, or stripes on the road

Image
Time-travel with me into the future. Where we're going, we'll still need roads, but our cars won't need the kind of stuff that human drivers need, like stop signs, or stuff painted on the road. And if you're already panicking that computers will take over, don't worry, they already have. The fact that you're reading this right now combines so much amazing computing power that it would have been unthinkable to anyone in the 1960s, or '70s, when I was a kid. Speaking of being in the geriatric age group, if you're like me or older, you took a lot of pride in knowing the rules of the road, such as what to do at a stop sign if four cars approach at the same time, the difference between a "yield" sign and a "merge" sign, or maybe how to parallel park. But calm down there old-timer, that type of knowledge will just be as quaint as how to use a horse and buggy is nowadays. Sorry! The best way to picture how traffic will flow in the future is ...
Read more

Watching a neighborhood grow and change in Phoenix, Arizona

Image
I stopped to take a closer look yesterday at where the old Circle K had been in my neighborhood, which is a suburb of Phoenix. And it's got me to thinking about how much Phoenix grows and changes over the years, and how people feel about it. This particular neighborhood was built in the mid 1980s, when there had been only a smattering of houses and a community college (Glendale Community College, built in 1965). There are some houses that I can tell are from the 1970s, and a few even older, but what happened here is that the neighborhood suddenly appeared in 1985 or thereabouts. There are three shopping centers on the corner of 67th Avenue and Peoria - the one in the photo is called "Peoria Station", and it was designed to kinda look like a train station. The other three are called Westporte Village, Brittany Square, and Crossroads Plaza. I've lived in this neighborhood for a very long time, and no one ever uses those names, even though the signs are still up. But the...
Read more

Why did Adolf Hitler always have such a bad haircut?

Image
As someone who has been interested in history since I was a little kid, I've always asked the most childish questions, and quite often never got an answer. As a kid, I was told to run along and play, and don't bother the grownups, so I set my questions aside to work on when I myself became a grownup. But some questions I really haven't found a satisfactory answer for, and get thrown away as I find myself learning the more important stuff. I now understand the grownups, but the kid in me still has childish questions like "Why did Adolf Hitler always have such a bad haircut?" The first question to ask is whether a particular style (whether hair, clothing, etc.) was in style at the time. The moustache was, and you can Google a photo of Charlie Chaplin, who wore the same style of moustache at the time, and quite stylishly. The wide lapels were in style in the 1930s, as was were the tall shirt collars and small ties. But the haircut wasn't - it's just awful. Me...
Read more