Assessing Urban Community Gardens’ Impact on Net Primary Production using NDVI

Urban Farm DB summary

This study used the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) from U.S. Landsat 5, 7, and 8 satellites to assess the environmental impact of urban community gardens across three eastern U.S. cities—Roanoke, VA; Pittsburgh, PA; and Buffalo, NY—over the 2007–2015 growing seasons. It reports that establishing community gardens altered seasonal NDVI trajectories, sometimes declining initially but then increasing over time, revealing the vigorous vegetative character of urban agriculture.