Growing demand brings community garden to Geneva Avenue at last

Plastic forks keep intruders away at the Alice Street Community Garden in downtown San Francisco, Ca. on Tuesday Feb. 7, 2017. Another community garden is set to be added to the list of nearly fifty, as the city prepares to open Geneva Community Garden. less Plastic forks keep intruders away at the Alice Street Community Garden in downtown San Francisco, Ca. on Tuesday Feb. 7, 2017. Another community garden is set to be added to the list of nearly fifty, as the ... more Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Buy photo Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 5 Caption Close Growing demand brings community garden to Geneva Avenue at last 1 / 5 Back to Gallery

Near the end of the 19th century, the rolling hills near Balboa Park were empty of homes and infrastructure. Neat rows of cabbage were sowed each spring, and livestock grazed.

All that’s left of those pastoral days is a steep sliver of land near Geneva and Delano avenues. For nearly three decades, residents have been trying to turn the space into a community garden — a return to the area’s early farmland days. But funding shortfalls and then soil contamination, and then rain, stalled the project.

But the Geneva Community Garden will finally break ground Thursday. Soon it will be home to more than 50 raised garden boxes. Already, 28 people have signed up to use the plots.

“We are taking a fallow piece of land and turning it into an active green space,” said Supervisor Ahsha Safai, whose district includes the community garden. “It’s just been sitting there for five or six years. It took a lot longer than expected, and the city had to put the project out to bid a few times. It will add a lot of beauty to the neighborhood.”

The lot is a few blocks from the Balboa Park BART Station in the Outer Mission. A smattering of evergreen and fruit trees grow near the space’s perimeter, but invasive pampas grass and ivy choke the ground. On a recent morning, water seeped down the slope and collected in pools.

The project was funded by a $387,534 grant from the 2008 Clean and Safe Neighborhood Parks bond, and another $55,000 in discretionary funding from former district Supervisor John Avalos. Residents had been using the space for gardening for years, but it wasn’t a part of the city’s Community Gardens Program.

After high concentrations of lead were found in the topsoil in 2008 — the result of toxic runoff from a nearby Muni repair yard — another $900,000 was needed for intensive remediation.

Nearly nine years later, officials from the city’s Recreation and Park Department now estimate that the gardens will open this summer.

Thousands of residents already maintain plots in the department’s 38 other gardens from Pacific Heights to the Bayview to the Outer Sunset. The communal urban farming plots boast clumps of kale, carrots, corn, artichokes, fruit trees and other produce. Some are filled with sunflowers.

The program was started by the Rec and Park Department more than 10 years ago, and some plots have waiting lists that run to years. There are 111 people, for example, waiting for one of the 18 community garden slots at States Street in Corona Heights. Another 112 residents are queued up for one of the 21 spaces at Michelangelo Community Garden on Russian Hill — only one plot turned over there last year.

It’s part of a nationwide trend to grow more food locally and sustainably. David Hooper, a 30-year resident of Mission Terrace and president of the neighborhood’s improvement association, said it reminded him of the popularity of the Victory Gardens during World War II.

“About 30 years ago, you noticed small produce markets starting to pop up in the city,” Hooper said. “There has been an increased value in urban gardening and farming. I love the emphasis on growing your own vegetables. There is great value in actually reaching into the soil and doing it yourself. The Geneva Community Garden gives people a place to do that.”

Hooper said he won’t be vying for a plot of land. He already grows artichokes, apples and roses in his backyard garden.

It’s the beauty of the space, he said, that he’s looking forward to. The project will bring new perimeter walls, fencing and gates to the space, and a communal landscaped area. But other neighbors are already sketching out plans for what to plant in their gardens.

“It grabs my heart to see how much dedication people have for this space,” said Jorge Palafox, 59, of the Outer Mission.

“There have been so many hang-ups and delays, and the project fell off our radar at some point. I am very, very, very happy it’s finally happening. We definitely need more space like this all over the city.”

Lizzie Johnson is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: ljohnson@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @LizzieJohnsonnn