No mention of how to turn that land into productive farmland or what the criteria is for deciding who gets to buy the land once it is claimed via emminant domain. I expect Monsanto to get a lot of it under the argument that they are feeding detroit with their seeds and thus the public as a whole benefits.
Being in a pocket in an expanse of green isn't a good place to be when the fuel runs out either.
Planting trees for fuel would fix both problems (productive farmland, later; and fuel). Tree roots do a wonderful job of breaking down concrete and asphalt, and some species will grow almost anywhere. Resurrecting the concept of neighborhood (village) commons and leaving them as public domain may also be useful.
I live in an area where large numbers of small holdings farm homesteads were abandoned during the 1930's. Most of these places are now open fields. The buildings were stripped, pushed into the basements and then generally burned. The sites were then roughly leveled and left to revert to natural grasses. Finally when the building sites can no longer be seen the land is cultivated.
