Super Levee Urban Farm

The project expands necessary infrastructural and environmental improvements to propose a more productive urban and personal life.

To safeguard against future disaster from rising sea levels, the world’s cities must invest heavily in new forms of infrastructural development. Super Levee Urban Farm capitalizes on the need for urban improvement, expanding the necessary infrastructural and environmental interventions to propose a more productive urban and personal life. The project proposes a global system of levees, serving as a new brand of urban farms at the city’s edge, preserving local ecologies while protecting cities from emerging dangers. By appropriating and expanding “super levee” construction technology, the city is reconnected with the waterfront.

Each stage of the levee structure supports the next. Tidal ecosystems, endangered dune ecologies, saltwater marshes, and agricultural production are supported in the system’s nested terraces. Urban runoff and wastewater is re-purposed throughout, and filtered to replenish natural water bodies beyond. Clippings, compost, and surplus crops from upper farming levels are used as nutrients and food for the levels below. Waste from marine life and nutrients from algal habitats are then repurposed to fertilize farm levels, making the levee a complete ecology.