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Creating Life from Waste

Since 1957, Garden-Ville in San Antonio, TX has been taking food and industrial waste and making compost for farms and gardens, and wood chips for landscapes and playgrounds.

In hard economic times, cities need to make the most of what they’ve got. I recently visited Garden-Ville in San Antonio where they’re taking the area’s wastes and making materials for farms, gardens, and playgrounds. That’s revitalization!

They are taking food wastes from local restaurants, hotels, and other institutions. They can take construction waste and trimmings from landscaping. Of course, there’s always manure. They can even use shaved hair from recent Army recruits! They’ve got a scientific system to optimally convert these materials that other people discard. And the result is compost for growing fruits and vegetables and plants, mulch for landscaping. And wood chips to cushion playgrounds. This story inspires me to think about ways to make waste useful as well as something that can bring beauty and life to communities.

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