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Bristol, CO

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2022

Project Category: Community Gardens

Description: This project installed a garden with raised bed planters and ADA-compliant benches -- as well asan historical mural, veterans memorial and wind sculpture -- at the town's new community center.

Montclair, CA

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021

Project Category: Community Gardens

Description: Montclair Community Garden has long been used by community members as a central gathering place, despite a lack of older adult-friendly amenities. The Montclair Community Foundation installed three raised garden beds, specifically designed for people with mobility restrictions, those who cannot easily bend down and gardeners who use wheelchairs. Additionally, the foundation installed an ADA-compliant picnic table, an 18-by-27-foot shade structure and new LED lighting. These changes enable residents of all ages and abilities to enjoy the garden. Now that the improvements are complete, project organizers say they are piloting a health education program at the garden, which will welcome patients whose doctors have recommended they spend time outdoors.

Green Bay, WI

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021

Project Category: Community Gardens

Description: The Farmory is a nonprofit urban farm, where community members can learn about sustainable agriculture and aquaponics. However, many of the farm's features were inaccessibly to visitors who rely on wheelchairs or other mobility devices. To make the space more accessible, the Farmory installed a new aquaponics system, which is low to the ground. This allows visitors to see the farm's growing systems without needing to climb onto a ladder. The system consists of four growing beds, water tanks, a germinating chamber and a harvesting area. Today, produce grown with the new aquaponics system also helps combat food insecurity -- the Farmory donates about ten pounds of greens each week to the county's Aging and Disability Resource Center.

Nearby AARP Community Challenge Projects

Birmingham, AL

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2023

Project Category: Walkability

Description: The project will increase walkability in Birmingham neighborhoods by using walk audits to evaluate them. The data will be shared with community groups so they can see the challenges that residents aged 50 face, and highlight the need for safer, more accessible streets, sidewalks, paths and trails.

Birmingham, AL

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021

Project Category: Bikeability

Description: For years, Birmingham's busy Titusville neighborhood did not have a strong north/south connector for pedestrians and bicyclists. To address this, the Freshwater Land Trust installed a buffered bike lane -- the Titusville Connector -- along First Street South for five blocks to create a safe and equitable alternative transportation and recreation route for residents living in and around the community. The bike lane, which is located next to an elementary school and links to the multi-modal Neighborway path, allows residents to reach local amenities and the local bus rapid transit route. The Connector's brightly painted lane runs between the sidewalk and parallel parking spaces, making it the first, separated in-street trail in Birmingham.

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