Growing Community Through Farming

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Community Impact

education
land stewardship
environmental impact
access to infrastructure
business development
opportunity

“Having access to the Farm Campus would be something amazing for younger farmers to be able to get experience while they work on building a business.”
— Jason Bdzula, Wolfberry Hawthorn Farm

Explore Farm Campus

Incubator Farm

An incubator farm will train and support the next generation of sustainable urban farmers by providing land, access to equipment, and education for multiple new and beginning farmers at Farm Campus. The incubator farm will have areas for on-farm demonstrations of small and urban-scale agriculture techniques, selection of appropriate crops and management techniques,  regenerative agriculture practices, and controlled-environment and precision agriculture.

Post-Harvest Food Education

A post-harvest food education facility will serve incubator farmers on farm campus and potentially other local farmers. The facility can offer cold/dry storage and space to facilitate aggregation, processing, distribution, and marketing. This facility aims to address documented shortages of cold storage and aggregation space in our area.

Shared Kitchen and Meeting Space

A value-added production facility will provide a shared kitchen/commissary and meeting space to enable producers, entrepreneurs, and community members to develop skills in value-added agricultural production, such as turning bruised tomatoes into salsa with a longer shelf life for sales and a higher value per pound. It is hoped that the facility will include multiple commercial kitchens to help address the shortage of commercial kitchen access in our region and could serve food entrepreneurs as well as farmers.

Healing Garden

A healing garden will provide Durham residents with opportunities to connect with the land – and the plants and animals that live on it. Opportunities for therapeutic horticulture will be offered, in addition to offering a space for environmental and ecological education. This space will be open to all in Durham county, not just those involved in the farm campus, and will have an emphasis on flowers for pollinators, culinary and medicinal herbs, and ornamental plants.

Incubator Farm img
Healing garden

Land

The land for Farm Campus is part of a 129-acre property located at the corner of 15-501/North Roxboro Road and Orange Factory Road (a State-designated scenic byway) in North Durham.

The land includes 43 acres of cleared agricultural land, 48 acres of forested land, and 4 ponds totaling 8.9 acres. It is approximately 9 miles north of Downtown Durham, in a location that is ideal for serving both central and northern Durham residents within the recently adopted Urban Growth Boundary. It is adjacent to property owned by the Triangle Land Conservancy. This Orange Factory Road land is beautiful and healthy with a variety of trees and wildlife and offers additional opportunities for the community to experience the natural environment.

In the fall of 2023, a landowner contacted Durham County Open Space and Real Estate staff to offer this land for sale to Durham County with a hope of seeing a portion of the land used for agricultural purposes. The purchase was approved by the Board of County Commissioners and finalized in 2024.

Feasibility Study

The Farm Campus feasibility study explores the potential for establishing a Farm Campus with and for Durham County residents to address the root causes of food insecurity by launching the next generation of sustainable urban farmers through increased access to land, skills and training in agriculture techniques, infrastructure, and markets for new and beginning farmers.

Durham County Cooperative Extension received a USDA Urban Agriculture and Innovative Production (UAIP) grant to study the design and function of the idea and established an advisory team to guide the
process.

The study examines the proposed components, including incubator farm space, healing garden, dry and cold storage facility, and commercial kitchen capacity for value-added production along with possible
governance structures to ensure community leadership and decision-making are central to the Farm Campus. The community engagement portion of the study reflects the views of stakeholders and
potential users of the site.

The community can review the results of the study and participate in further conversation through Durham County’s capital planning process for the entire property, which will be informed by the feasibility study to help determine the community uses of the property for farm campus, facilities and open space opportunities. Check out the Farm Campus Blog for the latest news.

Healing garden

News & Updates

Land

Land

Do you know anyone who has ever started a farm? It probably was not...

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