Gotham Greens Will Double Their Growing Capacity With New Greenhouse

Mayor Rahm Emanuel and 9th Ward Alderman and other city officials recently broke ground on the largest greenhouse in the city of Chicago. This project will provide the community with several new jobs.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel and 9th Ward Alderman and other city officials recently broke ground on the largest greenhouse in the city of Chicago. This project will provide the community with several new jobs.

Gotham Greens Will Double Their Growing Capacity With New Greenhouse

BY KATHERINE NEWMAN

Gotham Greens recently broke ground on a new 140,000 square foot indoor farm in Pullman. Once completed the state-of-the-art facility will be the largest greenhouse in Chicago and provide several new jobs for the community. The new greenhouse will be located near Gotham Green’s existing rooftop greenhouse on top of the Method soap factory on 111th St.

Gotham Greens originated in New York and is a worldwide pioneer in the field of urban agriculture and a leading regional producer of hyper-local, premium-quality, greenhouse-grown vegetables and herbs, according to the Gotham Greens website. They currently have four facilities in New York and Chicago.

Chicago Neighborhood Initiatives (CNI), a local non-profit, has partnered with Gotham Greens to develop this project. CNI was involved with helping create the original rooftop garden on the Method soap factory which Gotham Greens quickly grew out of. The new facility with double their growing capacity, according to David Doig, president of CNI.

Over the course of the last year or so they have realized that they already maxed out their growing capacity on the rooftop.

They approached us about expanding and building another greenhouse and they looked at some different sites and ultimately settled on Pullman. Mostly because they already had a facility here and they had such a great experience working with the community and finding local talent that they wanted to stay here in Pullman,” said Doig.

At their initial rooftop greenhouse, Gotham Greens was able to hire around 60 people from the Pullman community, the expansion will allow them to her 60 more and they are committed to giving opportunities to community members, according to Doig.

“These are generally kind of starter, low-skill jobs so you don’t have to have a masters degree or even a college education to work at Gotham Greens. A lot of their employees are young people and kids from the community and this is really their first job. It’s a great opportunity to get folks into the workforce and get them some training and job experience,” said Doig.

Doig explained that CNI worked as the site developer for this project, as they have with many other development projects on the south side of Chicago. CNI took on the responsibility of developing the land for this project.

“We develop all of the land, we do all of the underground utilities, the environmental work, we do all of the mass grading, we do the site prep and then basically we turn over the finished pad-ready site to Gotham Greens and they develop the verticals and they own the real estate,” said Doig.

CNI has been involved in developing most of the recent projects in Pullman like the Planet Fitness, Walmart, and a new Whole Foods distribution center. Doig said the organization will continue to do high-impact real estate projects that bring economic opportunity and jobs to Chicago.

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