Community gardening

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Strathcona Heights Community Garden.
Strathcona Heights Community Garden.

A community garden is a piece of land gardened by a group of people. [1] Community gardens provide access to fresh produce and plants as well as access to satisfying labor, neighborhood improvement, sense of community and connection to the environment [2] They are publicly functioning in terms of ownership, access and management, [3] as well as typically owned in trust by local governments or nonprofits.

A city’s community gardens can be as diverse as its communities of gardeners. Some choose to solely grow flowers, others are nurtured communally and their bounty shared, some have individual plots for personal use, while others are equipped with raised beds for disabled gardeners.

Community gardens encourage an urban community’s food security, allowing citizens to grow their own food or for others to donate what they have grown.[4] The gardens also combat two forms of alienation that plague modern urban life, by bringing urban gardeners closer in touch with the source of their food, and by breaking down isolation by creating a social community. It has also been found that active communities experience less crime and vandalism.[5]


Contents

[edit] What makes a community garden?

Like traditional public parks, most community gardens are open to the public, and provide green space in urban areas, along with opportunities for social gatherings, beautification, education and recreation. However, in a key difference, community gardens are managed and maintained with the active participation of the gardeners themselves, rather than tended only by a professional staff. A second difference is food production: Unlike parks, where plantings are ornamental (or more recently ecological), community gardens often encourage food production by providing gardeners a place to grow vegetables and other crops. To facilitate this, a community garden may be divided into individual plots or tended in a communal fashion, depending on the size and quality of a garden and the members involved.[6]


As discussed below, "community garden" is the term favored in the United States and Canada, with a strong presence in Australia and New Zealand as well. The best source and clearinghouse on community gardening information in North America is a coalition of community gardening groups The American Community Gardening Association.[7]

Community gardens vary widely throughout the world. In North America, community gardens range from familiar "victory garden" areas where people grow small plots of vegetables, to large "greening" projects to preserve natural areas, to tiny street beautification planters on urban street corners. In Europe, closely related "allotment gardens" can have dozens of plots, each measuring hundreds of square meters and rented by the same family for generations. In the developing world, commonly held land for small gardens is a familiar part of the landscape, even in urban areas, where they may function as mini-truck farms.

For all their diversity, however, most community gardens share at least four elements in common: Land (or a place to grow something); plantings; gardeners; and some sort of organizing arrangements.

Land for a community garden can be publicly or privately held. One strong tradition in American community gardening in urban areas is cleaning up abandoned vacant lots and turning them into productive gardens. Alternatively, community gardens can be seen as a health or recreational amenity and included in public parks, similar to ball fields or playgrounds. Historically, community gardens have also served to provide food during wartime or periods of economic depression. Access to land and security of land tenure remains a major challenge for community gardeners and their supporters throughout the world, since in most cases the gardeners themselves do not own or control the land directly.[8]


Some gardens are grown collectively, with everyone working together; others are split into clearly divided plots, each managed by a different gardener (or group or family). Many community gardens have both "common areas" with shared upkeep and individual/family plots.

Two national surveys sponsored by the American Community Gardening Association in the late 1980s and mid-1990s, and other research, strongly support the observation that there is no "standard" community garden plot size, at least in the United States and Canada. Individual plot sizes vary widely depending on many factors, including location, land available for gardening, demand, physical and time limitations of the gardeners, among others. As a general rule, North American community garden plots so tend to be smaller than European allotments. 6m × 6m (20ft × 20ft) is one common plot size (larger gardens in parks); 3m × 3m (10ft × 10 ft) or 3m × 4.5 m (10 ft × 15 ft) is another (inner city gardens on small lots).

While food production is central to many community and allotment gardens, not all have vegetables as a main focus. Restoration of natural areas and native plant gardens are also popular, as are "art" gardens. Many gardens have several different planting elements, and combine plots with such projects as small orchards, herbs and butterfly gardens. Individual plots can become "virtual" backyards, each highly diverse, creating a "quilt" of flowers, vegetables and folk art.

Gardeners may form a grassroots group to initiate the garden, such as the Green Guerrillas of New York City, or a garden may be organized "top down" by a municipal agency. The community gardening movement in North American prides itself on being inclusive, diverse, pro-democracy, and supportive of community involvement. Gardeners may be of any cultural background, young or old, new gardeners or seasoned growers, rich or poor. A garden may have only a few people active, or hundreds.

Finally, all community gardens have a structure. The organization depends in part on whether the garden is "top down" or "grassroots". There are many different organizational models in use for community gardens. Some elect boards in a democratic fashion, while others can be run by appointed officials. Some are managed by a Non-profit organizations, such as a community gardening association, a church, or other land-owner; others by a city's recreation or parks department, a school or University. In most cases, gardeners are expected to pay annual dues to help with garden upkeep, and the organization must manage these fees. The tasks in a community garden are endless - keeping up the area's appearance, mulching paths, recruiting new members, reminding members to tend plots when they get weedy, fundraising, the list goes on... Sensible rules and an 'operations manual' are both invaluable tools, and ideas for both are available at ACGA and other sites.

[edit] Examples

[edit] United Kingdom

In the United Kingdom, community gardening is generally distinct from allotment gardening, though the distinction is sometimes blurred. Allotments are generally plots of land rented to individuals for their cultivation by local authorities or other public bodies—the upkeep of the land is usually the responsibility of the individual plot owners. Allotments tend (but not invariably) to be situated around the outskirts of built-up areas. Use of allotment areas as open space or play areas is generally discouraged.

The community garden movement is of more recent provenance than allotment gardening, with many such gardens were built on bombed and derelict inner-city sites in the aftermath of The Blitz. A community garden in the United Kingdom tends to be situated in a built-up area and is typically run by an independent non-profit organisation (though this may be wholly or partly funded by public money). It is also likely to perform a dual function as an open space or play area (in which role it may also be known as a 'city park') and—while it may offer plots to individual cultivators—the organisation that administers the garden will normally have a great deal of the responsibility for its planting, landscaping and upkeep. An example inner-city garden of this sort is Islington's Culpeper Community Garden, or Camden's Phoenix Garden.

Ringwood Community Garden
Ringwood Community Garden

[edit] Australia

Australian City Farms & Community Gardens Network — national association of city farms, community gardens and sustainability education centres: [9]

[edit] Canada

[edit] British Columbia

  • BC Food Systems Network, Sorrento
  • Community Gardens in Greater Vancouver and Victoria, Vancouver
  • LifeCycles Project Society, Victoria

[edit] Northwest Territories

  • Inuvik Community Greenhouse, Inuvik (north of the Arctic Circle!)

[edit] Saskatchewan

  • Saskferco Community Gardens, Moose Jaw
  • Saskferco - Grow Regina Community Garden, Regina
  • CHEP - Child Hunger and Education Program, Saskatoon

[edit] Ontario

[edit] United States

In Canada and the United States, "community gardening" encompasses a wide variety of approaches. Some influential community gardens, such as the Clinton Street garden in the middle of Manhattan in New York City, and the Peralta garden in Berkeley, California, inspired by architect and community garden visionary Karl Linn, are gathering places for neighbors and showcases for whimsical art and ecological awareness, with food production cherished but seen as one part of a much larger vision. Other gardens resemble European "allotment" gardens, with plots where individuals and families can grow vegetables and flowers, including a number (for instance, in Minneapolis and Ann Arbor, Michigan) which began as "Victory Gardens" during World War II. Even such "food" gardens are very different, however — for instance, plot sizes range widely from as small as 1.5m × 1.5m (5 ft × 5 ft) in some inner city gardens and art gardens, such as the Dovetail Garden in Charlotte, North Carolina, to relatively large plots of 15m × 15m (50ft × 50ft) such as those at Hilton Head, South Carolina.

Some community gardens, in contrast, are devoted entirely to creating ecological green space or habitat, still others to growing flowers, and others to education or providing access to gardening to those who otherwise could not have a garden, such as the elderly, recent immigrants or the homeless — for example, the Community Garden for the Homeless, also in Charlotte, not far away from the very different Dovetail Garden. Some gardens are worked as community farms with no individual plots at all, shading into becoming urban farms.

In short, the key word to describe the United States is "diversity."

That said, a majority of gardens in a majority of community gardening programs are collections of individual garden plots, frequently between 3m × 3m (10'×10') and 6m × 6m (20'×20'). This holds true whether they are sponsored by public agencies such as Park and Recreation Districts (Portland, Oregon; Toronto, Canada), city departments (Seattle, Washington — perhaps the model community gardening program in the US), large non-profits, or (most commonly) a coalition of different entities and groups, Whether the garden is run as a coop by the gardeners themselves (still common in New York, Boston and other East Coast cities) or managed by a public or non-profit agency, plot holders typically are asked to pay a modest fee each year and abide by a set of rules. Many gardens also encourage activities such as work days, fundraisers, and social gatherings. Community garden organizers typically say that "growing community" is as important as growing vegetables, or, as the American Community Gardening Association (ACGA) puts it: "In community gardening, "community" comes first."

Equally important, according to ACGA, is encouraging political involvement. As storied New York community gardener Adam Honigman puts it: "Community gardening is 50% gardening and 100% local political organizing." Community gardens are more than a meeting ground — they are also a training ground for political empowerment. In a sense, as Karl Linn pointed out, they are the 21st Century version of the New England village green, common space that brings people together and inspires shared action.

ACGA, a non-profit coalition founded in 1979, is the primary advocacy group for community gardening in the US and Canada. After many years of being hosted by the community garden support program Philadelphia Green in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, ACGA is now based at the Franklin Park Conservatory in Columbus, Ohio.

Although community gardening exists across northern North America, it remains strongest in the Northeast, where literally thousands of community gardens grow in New York City, Philadelphia and Boston. It is also strong along the West Coast, especially in British Columbia, and in Midwestern centers such as Chicago and Minneapolis.

The European history of community gardening in the US dates back to the early 1700s, when Moravians created a community garden as part of the community of Bethabara, near modern Winston-Salem, North Carolina - a garden still active and open for visitors today! First Nations peoples also gardened with a community approach (Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden paints a picture of gardens among the Hidatsa), likely for generations before the arrival of waves of immigrants.

Academic study of American community gardening by T.J. Bassett and more recently Laura Lawson ("City Bountiful") suggests that the community gardening "movement" is best described as a series of distinct phases each with contrasting ideologies and purposes, even though all resulted in people creating gardens on public or abandoned land. The latest phase began with the alternative politics and culture and dawning ecological activism of the late 1960s.

From the mid-1970s through the early 1990s, community gardening in a select number of major American cities enjoyed Federal financial support, though many programs struggled to find funding. The loss of the Federal program increased the challenge of finding funding to support programs. Funding remains a key challenge, along with secure land tenure for garden sites, finding insurance, and helping gardeners develop ways to work together smoothly.

Community gardening in the United States overlaps to some extent with the related but distinct movement to encourage local food production, local farmers' markets and community supported agriculture farms (CSAs). Leases and rules prevent some, though not all, community gardeners from selling their produce commercially, although their gardens may donate fresh fruits and vegetables to local food pantries, cooperatives, and homeless members of their community. However, community gardens offer ideas sites for local farmers markets, and gardeners often seek farmers to provide space-intensive crops such as corn or potatoes. They also can hire farmers to provide services such as plowing and providing mulch and manure. In turn, small farmers can reach a wider audience and consumer base by drawing on community gardeners and their contacts. Although the two approaches are distinct, both can be effective ways to produce local food in urban areas, safeguard green space, and contribute to food security.

In an interesting variant on the practice of reclaiming bombed-out areas for community gardens (also practiced during WWII in the ghettos of Eastern Europe), in American inner-cities, community groups have reclaimed abandoned or junked lots for garden plots. In these cases, groups have subsequently leased from a municipality that claims the property or claimed squatter's rights or a right to subsistence not currently recognized by the legal system. Two notable cases include the gardens of Manhattan's lower Eastside and the South Central Farm of Los Angeles, California. A lasting legacy of the New York gardens is 'guerrilla gardening', perfected by NYC's legendary "Green Guerrillas," founded by Liz Christy. In contrast, sadly, The South Central Farm was recently bulldozed in Los Angeles.

ACGA provides resources to assist anyone wishing to start a community garden or find a garden near their home, as well as training classes in community gardening organizing and management. They also offer a website, a newsletter, an email listserv and a magazine. ACGA's most recent survey suggests that the total number of community gardens around the US alone is over 5000.

[edit] Boston, Massachusetts

In the city of Boston, Massachusetts there are a variety of local and non-profit organizations which own, promote and manage approximately 180 community gardens throughout the city. These organizations include the Boston Natural Areas Network (BNAN), Boston Nature Center of the Massachusetts Audubon Society, Boston Parks and Recreation Department, Boston Urban Gardeners (BUG), MA Department of Conservation and Recreation, Dorchester Gardenlands Preserve, ReVision House, and the South End Lower Roxbury Open Space Land Trust.

In 2002, the volunteer-run Boston Community Garden Council was formed as a means of facilitating communication and cooperation between these organizations along with individual gardeners in Boston.

[edit] San Francisco, California

In San Francisco, community gardens are available through various public and private entities. Most community gardens in San Francisco are available through its Recreation and Park Department, which manages over 35 community gardens on City property. These are allotment gardens whereby individuals or groups volunteer to be assigned garden plots. Garden members within their respective gardens democratically organize themselves to set bylaws that are consistent with City policy. These gardeners often self-impose garden dues as a membership requirement to cover common expenses. To standardize the development and management of its community gardens, the Recreation and Park Commission adopted its Community Garden Policy in 2006.

Though not plot-based, the City's Department of Public Works supports communal-style gardening on City property whereby community groups participate in the development and maintenance of public gardens. No one person is responsible for any portion of the site. One group, a community-based and resident-led volunteer group in an underserved neighborhood called Bayview Hunters Point, has created an enclosed food-producing garden on City-owned land, as well as developed many residential urban farms around privately owned homes. This group, the Quesada Gardens Initiative, is one of many organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area working at the nexus of environmental justice, health and wellness and food security, and community-building.

All of the community gardens of San Francisco are listed on the San Francisco Garden Resource Organization [14] website with detailed directions and garden pictures of some of the gardens.

[edit] References

  1. ^ American Community Garden Association (2007) What is a community garden? http://www.communitygarden.org/learn/ access on Nov 1, 2007 at 10:53 PDT
  2. ^ Hannah, A.K. & Oh, P. (2000) Rethinking Urban Poverty: A look at Community Gardens. Bulletin of Science, Technology and & Society. 20(3). 207-216.
  3. ^ Ferris, J., Norman, C. & Sempik, J. (2001) People, Land and Sustainability: Community Gardens and the Social Dimension of Sustainable Development. Social Policy and Administration. 35(5). 559-568.
  4. ^ "Closing the nutrient loop: Using urban agriculture to increase food supply and reduce waste," Nelson, Toni, World Watch v. 9 (Nov./Dec. 1996) p. 10-17.
  5. ^ Melville Court, Chatham, Kent," Moiser, Steve, Landscape Design, no306 (Dec. 2001/Jan. 2002) p. 34.
  6. ^ Selected factors influencing the success of a community garden, by Gordon Arthur Clark. Kansas State University, 1980.
  7. ^ American Community Gardening Association
  8. ^ Visionaries and planners : the garden city movement and the modern community, Stanley Buder. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990. ISBN 0195061748
  9. ^ Australian City Farms & Community Gardens Network
  10. ^ Vera Street Community Garden
  11. ^ Ringwood Community Garden - Welcome
  12. ^ rocks_farm : Rocks Community Farm
  13. ^ [http:www.busseltoncommunitygarden.org.au]
  14. ^ SFGRO Home Page

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