PLANTING THE SEEDS OF COMMUNITY BROADWAY:Gardens, an open-air market and the arts come together in Superior's North End. BY SHELLEY NELSON NEWS TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER Volunteers are building a sense of community in Superior's North End, one garden box at a time. The North End Arts Council envisions a place where neighbors, artists, musicians, performers and gardeners can gather outside and get to know each other better. The Broadway Market would be that place. Located across the historic Trade and Commerce building -- the Old City Hall -- the market is taking shape in an unused parking lot at Broadway Street and Hammond Avenue. "The whole goal is to do art enrichment for people in this neighborhood," said Theresa Bobula, a facilitator and grant writer for the arts council. "Utilizing that building was just one of the things that was available to us to turn this empty parking lot into green space." During the next month, the arts council and volunteers will build garden boxes for flower and vegetable gardens. Members of the North End Arts Council were out Saturday finishing garden boxes that were started last fall with the help of the Boys and Girls Club in Superior. Flowers will fill the boxes next to Hammond and Broadway. Work has yet to begin on the vegetable beds that will run along the remaining edges of the lot. "Our plan is that we're going to build those in the next month or so, and people can adopt them. They can do community garden for neighbors," Bobula said. "Ideally, we'd love to have the seniors... and the kids in the neighborhood." Jim Postance of the Slow Food Convivium, which is working with the North End Arts Council on the project, said he hopes to see kids out selling their produce and learning to save seeds. Postance also belongs to the Seed Savers Exchange, which donated about $100 worth of seeds for the gardening project at Broadway Market. "Our eventual goal is to put up a structure here, an open-air structure, to perhaps have a farmer's market, allow people to sell their art, to have music maybe at lunch or on a Friday night," Bobula said. Concerts would be held early in the evening to avoid disturbing the neighborhood. The structure could include space for a year-round artisan bread shop. Margaret Karsky said she and her husband, Dale, are in the preliminary stages of planning the new business that could open later this summer. Karsky said her husband would run the shop, which would feature breads made with locally grown ingredients. Broadway Market will work to complement the artist community and farmer's market currently in the Winter Street Depot, Bobula said. The advantage of the Broadway Market is its high-traffic, visible location, she said. "We need to view the arts as an economic generator for our areas," said Karin Kraemer of Duluth Pottery in Superior. "It's already helping our neighborhood here. It's a better neighborhood because we've been here. It's just amazing. "Besides, its fun," Kraemer said. "I want to have a good time, hang out with interesting, creative people. When you learn to do creative things, then you learn to approach the rest of your life in a creative manner. You problem-solve. That's what art is about... solving problems." ____________________________________ SHELLEY NELSON can be reached at (218) 279-5501, (800) 456-8282 or by e-mail at snelson@ duluthnews.com.
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