Jack Parr from the Lincoln Downtown Association returns to show us how containers can make any urban setting more welcoming and beautiful. We’re taking you to downtown Lincoln, Nebraska, where more than 400 raised planters and containers add color and beauty to the city each year.
🌱 In this feature, you’ll learn:
How reservoir planters work to reduce watering needs
The difference between daily-watered standard planters vs. irrigation-connected systems
How the city plans and selects annual flowers each year
Popular plants used in downtown displays: petunias, canna lilies, and sweet potato vine
Why container plantings add life, color, and a sense of care to urban spaces
🌳 Urban Gardening Spotlight:
From the Haymarket to O Street, these containers showcase Nebraska-grown plants and creative design choices that brighten up streets, sidewalks, and gathering spaces. Learn how thoughtful plant selection and irrigation systems make large-scale urban gardening possible.
💌 Have a gardening question? Send us your pictures: byf@unl.edu
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#BackyardFarmer #ContainerGardening #UrbanGardening #DowntownLincoln #PlanterDesign #Petunias #CannaLilies #SweetPotatoVine
[Music] so these containers these raised planters that we’re seeing here there’s over 400 downtown that are planted every year annually we get our plants from Countryside green houses in beatric Nebraska so in the Hay Market we feature a lot of smaller metal large Planters those stay put every year but we do replant them every year annually as well as on every other lettered Street such as Q Street P Street and O Street and N Street and M Street all feature different styles of planters that we determine at the beginning of the year and then we order our plants so next to me here are a style of planter called a reservoir planter they contain about a 25g reservoir that allows us to fill them up at the beginning of the week and then the plants are able to suck up nutrients during the week allowing us to do it once a week watering a different style of plant that’s used downtown is just a standard planter with a drain at the bottom those ones require to be watered every day and what’s great is on P Street we have an irrigation system in place that hooks into the Planters as well as into our normal irrigation system so we can control also the Planters and the landscape beds as well allowing us to differentiate the amount of watering being used with the Planters and the landscape bed allowing for really great techniques of watering so each year sometime usually in around August or so we sit down with our Nursery and kind of go over what worked last year in the previous year what has worked in years prior and we kind of make our decision on what is going to be our next year’s decisions for each Planters a lot of times we stick with what we know works good patunas canas sweet potato vine but sometimes if we want to change it up with a specific type of grass to use as a centerpiece that’s when they’ll make those decisions right then and there here displayed we have some large canas that grow usually about as tall as I am here as well as some p Jas that go really well and they just Cascade off of the Planters I mean truly when you think of a of a downtown environment being pretty you always think about the addition of plants being there plants being present in that area and being able to add such color and and Pizzazz into the downtown area using these Planters is really important just because they look really nice and they look cool and I think that’s what’s important about having Planters downtown as they add that level of care and you could almost say luxury to a downtown area for
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THAT’S OOMF