The Toledo Water Project is a novel city plan spearheaded by a group of community members and researchers since 2014 that aims to vitalize and invigorate the city of Toledo using her authentic historical, environmental, and logistical features. In 2018, under Midstory Media Thinkhub, the project takes on a soft power through new media to impact the city through engaging and impacting multiple levels of people from the ground up and from the top down.

Using a native wildflower that has been an iconic signature here in the US as early as the 1800s—an important food item and touristic attraction to early settlers—this project envisions the potentials of water remediation through lotus aquaculture that sets the scene for a new toledo experiencicng transformative civic, social, and economic opportunities in a changing postindustrial era.

The answers to many of our region’s challenges already are within reach. Toledo’s water quality issues are directly attributed to the loss of nearly 99% of our historic wetlands. Yet Midstory’s mission goes beyond ecological remediation to consider the cultural and socioeconomic climate that impacts our everyday reality.

Midstory media thinkhub currently collaborates with local community groups and institutions to conduct research and pilot studies for the city’s benefit with creative and out-of-the-box ideas that are readily actionable. To learn more about our grassroots research project five years in the making and involving 30 plus independent researchers across disparate disciplines, we invite you to travel seven self-guided stations with us to experience the story and the vision guiding our project for Toledo.