Completed Project Report


Oneida County Urban Farm Learning Lab at Union Station

  • Award Amount: $39,991
  • Regional Center: Northeast Extension Risk Management Education Center
  • Grant Program: 2021 Education Projects
  • Project Director: Bonnie Collins
  • Email: bsc33@cornell.edu
  • Organization: Cornell Cooperative Extension Oneida County

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Project Overview

Cornell Cooperative Extension Oneida County (CCEOC) has established the Oneida County Urban Farm Learning Lab which is located in the retired Railway Express Agency (REA) wing at historic Union Station, in Utica, NY.

The Learning Lab has become an experiential training facility for aspiring urban farmers who face business start-up barriers and limited resources. Through the completion of the six-week aspiring farmers have a better understanding to help manage their business risks in the areas of production, market development, and business/financial planning. In addition, we have assisted aspiring farmers in locating potential growing space, access to capital, and other resources.

Overall, we had twenty-three individuals that participated during the ’21 and ’22 summer growing seasons. Participants worked in teams in this experimental training facility, learning to cultivate and harvest products. This allowed them to have hands-on experience and to learn some of the challenges that might happen in their urban growing settings (i.e., aphides and water conditions in an indoor growing system).

Education and training provided individuals with business planning and risk reduction in a workshop, focus-discussion groups, and hands-on participation in growing vegetables, herbs, and food items. Without the learning lab programming, these aspiring urban farmers would not have the ability to access this information.

Through grant funding received from the Northeast Extension Risk Management Education Center (NERME) and a facility-use partnership with Oneida County, the Urban Farm Learning Lab was established in 2021 and successfully offered two years of free public programming to Oneida County Residents.  

Number of Participants: 23

Outcomes

Project Steps

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EDUCATIONAL MATERIALS

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