PROJECT OVERVIEW

LOOK TO THIS PAGE FOR A DESCRIPTION OF THE PROJECT, ITS VENUES, ITS DEVELOPMENT, ITS SUPPORT

Anticipated Venues at the Visitor Orientation Center:

• Garden of Eating (Copyrighted and Trademarked) 
• Wine Tasting Room and Wine Sales Shop
  
• Fruit/Berry Smoothies Shop
• Snack Bar - Food Court
• Chocolate Factory - The aroma of chocolate wafts through the air, with a wide array of chocolates for sale.
• Fruit and Vegetable Stand (for on-the-road and take-home enjoyment)
• Book and Gift Shop
• Visitor Admission Ticket Sales and Orientation
• Restrooms
• First-Aid Stand/Information
• Theatre
• Reception Center - For social gatherings, weddings, etc. with a wonderful floral-landscaped backdrop.
• Senior Kiosk -- Center for information/sales on Annuities, Medicare, Financial Planning, Estate Planning, etc.
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• Evolutionary Trail (Plant Exhibits showing their evolutionary history)
  
• Crystal Palace (adjoining to Visitor Orientation Center - large glass-house with tropical exhibit)

Other Garden Venues:

• RV Campground - approximate accommodation anticipated at 100 pads
• Agricultural Food-Plant Exhibit -- Includes Vineyards, Rowcrops, Berries, Fruit and Nut Orchard - California Agriculture on Display with several acres of Exhibits showing various phases of growing for the row-crops.
• Seed Garden Exhibit -- A prime color-spot showing a wide array of flowers grown for the seed industry.
• Rose Garden - A wonderful floral exhibit, also showing modern derivation of rose industry from wild roses.
• Garden of Scents
• Main Garden - Phylogenetic Layout of temperate plants showing family relationships; meandering paths follow a Main Phylogenetic Trail
• Performing Arts Center (outdoor amphitheater for performing arts)
• Caley Anthony Memorial Children's Garden  -- A Children's Garden established in memory of children killed by parents or others
• Children's Maze
• Memorial Garden -- A memorial garden for various groups or individuals, including a memorial foot-path with memorial paving bricks meandering through the garden
• Equestrian Center
• Segway and Electric-Cart Trails

Environmental Concerns:

• Cruise Ships -- Due to the attractiveness of the botanical garden as a tourist destination, there is a potential for an increase in Cruise Ships visiting in Monterey Bay.  Past experiences with sporadic cruise ship visits have been problematic, and a close-eye will need to be maintained on such future visits. See:  Sierra Club, Ventana Chapter - Will Cruise Ships Pollute Monterey Bay?
• Tour Buses -- Tour buses spew diesel exhaust and can be noisy.  However, 35 people on 1 bus is arguably less offensive than 14 automobiles with an average of 2.5 persons/automobile.  It would actually be preferable to have more buses and fewer automobiles, to reduce overall traffic.  A requirement for biodiesel usage for buses visiting the gardens would serve to mitigate the diesel exhaust issue, as biodiesel exhaust smells good.  The slightly higher cost of biodiesel compared to petro-diesel should not be an economic obstacle for the tour bus operators.
• Automobile Traffic -- It is not expected that the botanical gardens will have a significant increase in tourism to the Monterey Bay area.  Rather, it is expected  that the existing tourists will linger longer - i.e. they will spend more time on their vacation in the area, increasing the Hotel and Accommodations revenue in the general Monterey Bay area.  The botanical garden itself will have minimal overnight  accommodation ability (potentially some RV pads, contingent upon zoning, matrix capacity, etc.).  Accordingly, the automobile exhaust increase will be negligible.  However, the carrying capacity of the highway leading to the botanical garden will be required to handle an expected increase of 60 automobiles/hour (about 1/minute) that would not otherwise already be present from existing usage.  
• Exotic Species -- Since the botanical garden will have exotic species that are not native to California, care will be required in their propagation to insure they are not invasive and do not escape.  Most of the exotic species are already present in California, due to introduction in agriculture and landscaping uses.  Any new (to California) exotic species will be required to go through a 'quarantine' period, in consultation with State authorities, before being introduced into the botanical garden.  Tropical species should have an easy 'pass', as they would not be able to survive outside of the Crystal Palace, due to the cold winters and freezing temperatures during the winter season.  Existing native species that are noxious, such as poison oak, will be kept to a minimum.
• Human Trash -- Littering will, of course, be banned.  All the food venues will strive to utilize recyclable materials.  A large emphasis on environmental awareness will be one of the themes of the botanical garden.  
• Water -- The botanical garden is cognizant of the low rainfall in the region, as well as the difficulties associated with ground water extraction, such as sea water intrusion near the coast.  The garden will utilize an extensive system of drip irrigation, recycling of waters, and rain catchment where feasible, and desalinization if required, so that it will use fewer water credits than presently needed for the land.
• Energy -- The botanical garden will strive to introduce solar energy conversion systems where feasible, and will be actively engaged in biomass energy extraction (algae oil experimentation, biodiesel extraction, etc.).  It is anticipated that the botanical garden will become a net energy exporter.

Scientific Purposes:

• Phylogenetic arrangement of the Main Garden.  Continuing advances in genetic studies of plants has resulted in a detailed phylogenetic tree of the approximately 120 families of flowering land plants, as well as the non-flowering land plants and sea plants.  This scientific arrangement of the plant species will be presented in the Main Garden.  A meandering phylogenetic pathway will take the visitor through an 'evolutionary trail' of relatedness showing the main features of each grouping/Order of plants.  Closely related families of plants will be adjacent to each other.  Each family of plants will have their various genera showing the relationships between those genera.  Extensive visual displays, with links to a computer database and gps location, will provide for a rich educational experience on plants and botany.  Back at the Visitor Orientation Center, an abbreviated Phylogenetic Trail will have a few species from each Order, allowing for a short 50-meter walk that will cover the essential features, with the main phylogenetic walk being outdoors with an extensive array of species.  It is expected that the Main Garden will eventually accommodate approximately 30,000 species.
• Secondary Gardens -- In addition to the Main Garden will be various Secondary Gardens.  These will include a Monterey/Santa Cruz Garden focusing on species native to the Monterey Bay area and its surrounding hills.  Additionally, the Agricultural Garden will have several sections, including a Fruit and Nut orchard with nearly every variety of fruit or nut tree grown in California; a Vineyard with both table grape varieties as well as European wine grapes, plus the native American grape; and a row-crop section for the abundant California fruits and vegetables grown in the Monterey Bay area.  Smaller sections will have other crops such as rice, wheat and cotton etc. that are not typically row-crop produce.  Other Secondary Gardens will include pleasing displays such as an extensive Rose Garden, Aroma Garden, Orchid and Bromeliad Garden (in the Crystal Palace), Caley Anthony Children's Memorial Garden, Main Memorial Garden, Charter Member Pathway, etc.
• Research Facilities -- Greenhouses for plant research will assist in furthering agricultural research, as well as pure botany research.  A close affiliation with existing research work will allow for graduate students to conduct their work at the garden.  Networking with existing universities in the nearby area, such as Stanford, UC Berkeley, UC Santa Cruz, Cal State University San Jose, Cal State University Monterey Bay, etc. will further the scientific goals.
• K-12 Outreach -- In addition to networking with other universities (both nearby, and distant via internet relationships), the botanical garden will develop an extensive outreach program to the neighboring communities.  School tours (with a greatly reduced student-admission, free chaperone, etc.) will showcase the botanical garden to the future parents and future families (translate - future customers) from nearby schools.  This will be an excellent learning experience for the students, with a hands-on learning environment.  Not only will they learn the basics of the local agriculture of the community, and fundamentals of botany, there will also be a general science learning center for hands-on experiences in chemistry, physics and biology.  Every student will have the opportunity to take seeds home to experiment with, and the opportunity to interface with the resident botanists.

Job Creation:

It is obvious that the botanical garden project will create jobs.  The initial phase (private investment) will spend approximately $20,000,000 which will go towards creation of temporary jobs, such as architectural planning and review, construction, nursery expenses, etc.  As the project becomes more visible to the public, the initial sale of Charter Memberships will raise additional capital, which will be directed towards continuation of the ongoing project, and expansion of the Main Garden to becoming the foremost botanical garden in the country, on par or superior to the gardens listed on the Home page.  More importantly, a large number of permanent long-term jobs are anticipated to be funded from the revenue that is generated by the tourist flow.  

With an expected initial tourist flow on the order of 1,000,000 visitors/year, that translates to roughly $15,000,000 in annual gate-admission revenue. Additionally, the large number of revenue generating venues, such as the Wine Tasting, Garden of Eating, Smoothie Bar, Gift Shop, etc. will all greatly increase the gross revenue by an anticipated additional approximately $15,000,000 annually, making the gross revenue approximately $30,000,000/year during the early years, and increasing thereafter.  This revenue will fund many excellent positions at the gardens, while making the botanical garden a major force for stimulation of additional job creation in the community.


Memorial  Plants:

The Memorial Garden will allow plantings not only in the Memorial Garden proper, but throughout the botanical garden.  Thus, landscape plants, Children's Garden plants, Main Garden plants, etc. can all be planted in memory of an individual or a group, with a data-base listing and plaque.  In the early phase of development, pricing will be lower as there will be more space left to develop.  Over time, the pricing will increase as the available space is used up.  Initial plants that are being readied for memorial plantings, and which will also serve as landscape plantings.  A partial listing follows:

• Sequoia gigantea  (Giant Sequoia Redwood); World's largest plant by volume, and arguably the longest living (Bristle Cone Pines might live longer) tree, these  trees are huge, and will serve as landscape backdrops.
• Sequoia sempervirens (Coastal Redwood); World's tallest plant, growing natively in the region of the botanical garden, these trees will serve as important landscape backdrops. 
• Metasequoia glyptostroboides (Dawn Redwood); A deciduous conifer from China, closely related to the Giant Sequoia redwood and Coastal redwood, these trees were once thought extinct until a small cluster was found growing in 1943 on the grounds of a local shrine, where it was preserved.
• Quercus suber (Cork oak); The oak tree of ancient cork commerce, and from which the name 'cork' is derived from Latin 'quercus', and which grows extensively in Spain and Portugal.
• Quercus lobata (Valley Oak); The largest of the oak trees, endemic to California, and living up to 600 years or longer, this stately oak is deciduous.
• Quercus robur (English Oak); A tall majestic deciduous oak, which served as the main construction material for the British sailing warships before replaced by ironclads.
• Quercus agrifolia (Coast Live Oak); An evergreen oak native to California and the Monterey Bay region, its acorn was a major source of starch for Native Americans before the advent of westernization.
• Orchidaceae (Orchid Family); An extremely large family of flowering plants from both temperate and tropical regions, of very showy blooms.  Both temperate and tropical orchids will be available for memorialization.
• Bromeliaceae (Bromeliad Family); Almost entirely tropical, these will be reserved for the Crystal Palace, with a few exceptions that do well in temperate environments such as selected species of Billbergia.
• Liliaceae (Lily family); An extensive family, the genera that are native to sunny habitats usually have narrow, parallel-veined leaves, capsular fruits with wind-dispersed seeds, bulbs, and large, visually conspicuous flowers.

The above partial listing are some of the more commonly used plantings for landscape purposes at the botanical garden; other species not listed are also available for memorialization.  Persons wishing to place an early order may use the Contact Us page for further information on pricing, size, growth, etc.  Since there is only a limited amount of space for the larger plants (Oaks, Redwoods, etc.) you should place an order soon to insure availability.

FRUIT SMOOTHIE RECIPES


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Pictures courtesy of Wikipedia commons.

Chandler Strawberries.  The History of strawberry development is fascinating, and will be part of the display on berry production.







Below are various other berries and other fruits that will be used for Fruit Smoothies at the Smoothy Shop adjacent to the Garden of Eating (TM).