Photo by Wunluv

What do you get when you mix a great idea with an abandoned plot of earthquake damaged freeway that had become a hot-spot for all sorts of generally frowned upon activities (drug use,  abuse, dealing, criminal activities and rodent olympics)? A biodynamic/permaculture community  farm and training centre of course!

The Hayes Valley Farm, in the heart of San Francisco has  transformed an urban wasteland into a innovative food producing garden that has become a community meeting place. Locals passing by in the cars on a sunny San Francisco-ian Saturday afternoon hoot and cheer at volunteers planting nitrogen fixing fava beans on terraformed slopes terraced with compost produced on-site and decomposing cardboard boxes donated by Google. They've got San Francisco's progressive mayor Gavin Newsmom involved, who has assisted with  seed funding and permission to use the space.

A cyclist pulls up to the fence and asks Jay Rosenberg, one of the core team members and founders of the project, for more information on how to volunteer. Zoey Kroll, a dedicated volunteer at the project and open source information architect, mixes tech with dirt and invites her peers from a Drupal conference to come over and plant trees. Zoey does guerrilla usability testing at the farm. No guerrillas were harmed during the tests.

Last two photos by Kevin Walsh