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Published Thursday, Jan. 10, 2008 | 3:57 p.m.
Updated Thursday, Oct. 30, 2008 | 2:14 p.m.
If you’re a city that has already built a faux Eiffel Tower rising out of a casino and a giant lake with explosive fountains that dance to Frank Sinatra songs, perhaps it’s only inevitable that Internet rumormongers will be only so happy to believe you’ll do just about anything.
How else to explain the latest wacky building rumor pinned to Las Vegas: a skyscraper farm.
The so-called “fact” that Las Vegas is building a giant skyscraper that will feed 72,000 people in the city – and serve as a tourist attraction - has been floating around for about a week now on “green business” web sites, Las Vegas building sites, and, of course, Wikipedia. Most of the reports reference a story in something called Next Energy News that cites “Nevada state officials” as saying that Las Vegas is building the $200 million 30-story building, the world’s first skyscraper farm.
Unbelievable? Uh, yeah. But a little too fantastic to totally ignore.
Turns out, the enticing and actually very serious-minded concept of a "vertical farm” was dreamed up by Dr. Dickson Despommier, a professor of public health at Columbia University. Despommier has spent the last ten years developing extensive plans and studies that explore the feasibility, necessity, and practicality of a giant tower that would feed city folks.
Web sites that “report” the building of the vertical farm in Las Vegas don’t mention Despommier by name, but include renderings and language lifted straight out of his vertical farm web site.
Problem is... Despommier doesn’t know anything about Las Vegas plans.
“I have absolutely nothing to do with it,” said Despommier, in an email. “My own opinion is that it’s just a hoax.”
It wouldn’t be the first time someone tried to prematurely tie a somewhat whimsical-sounding building project to Las Vegas. I enjoy the “dreams” page of the blog Vegas Today and Tomorrow for my fix of never-weres (sample: an Addams Family Resort and Casino!).
The story may be a hoax, but the concept is worth considering. Las Vegas is vulnerable with no locally produced food. Whether it's a vertical farm , conventional ones, or a major effort favoring urban gardens and edible landscape, we should be planning ways to increase our local food production. It is a matter of security and self-reliance.
The renderings that all these "Las Vegas Vertical Farm" articles are using are my designs. To see them...go to www.chrisjacobs.com. I've been working with Dr. Despommier for well over 2 years now - it's very interesting that this "Las Vegas Vertical Farm" story printed all over use our designs from www.verticalfarm.com site and say 30 stories ... which is straight from the first major article written about the vertical farm in New York Magazine. I'm suprised that I haven't heard from anyone about this....p. I let Dr. Dickson know about this today...asking him if he's heard of it...and he told me he had never heard of this Las Vegas venture. I've personally garnered some of the best minds and money people in Los Angeles to build one here...and we got very close.... I really wish someone would have emailed me about this project...I could help them having architected many high-profile meetings with growers...architects...developers...attorneys...etc, etc.