Community gardens

What is a community garden?

The American Community Gardening Association defines community garden broadly. A community garden can be urban, suburban, or rural. It can grow flowers, vegetables—or community. It can be one community plot or many individual plots. It can be located at a school, hospital, or in a neighborhood.

Another way of thinking about community gardens are as “community-managed open spaces." These differ from a park or public space where some other entity ultimately decides the purpose of the site and maintains it. Community gardens are where the residents of a community are empowered to design, build, and maintain spaces in the community.

Why community gardens?

Neighborhoods with successful gardens:

Combat food insecurity, both in quantity and quality
Build on the resources of cities, towns, and counties to deal with urban problems
Fight climate change by reducing the distance food travels, and minimize the carbon footprint of food
Boost the local economy
Improve community health through better nutrition and increased physical activity
Create social capital

In short, community gardens build stronger and safer communities.

Organize a community garden

The most important step in building a community garden is to assemble a community of people. A community garden without interested gardeners is just a vacant lot.

This step can take some time, but it's worth the investment in relationships that will sustain the site long term. It takes a lot of people to build a garden, and there are different roles that people can play—all are welcome and you will need a collection of different skills and resources.

While this is not a comprehensive list, here are some areas where you will need to recruit help:

Early leadership - Starting a community garden can take a lot of meetings, so it’s essential to have community members willing to take a leadership role early on. The success of a garden long-term often depends on being able to share leadership with all participants. But in the beginning, it’s important to have a small group of committed people who are willing to do the hard work of organizing and getting the project off the ground.

Building the garden - When it comes to the task of building the garden, technical skills are often needed for fence building or toolshed assembly. People with these skills are important for making the garden a reality and may or may not be interested in gardening.

Long-term gardeners - Many people like the idea of having a community garden in the neighborhood but don’t intend to garden there themselves. So, make sure you have a healthy list of people who will steward the garden long-term. Oftentimes these people won't be interested in the leadership or community meetings and process needed to get a garden started. But without them, you will have a hard time sustaining a garden.

General community support - It’s important to have the support of the local community, even those who don't intend to garden. Neighbors can keep an eye on the site, local businesses can donate food or other resources for work parties, community members can donate art or teaching skills or help haul excess produce to the food bank. Make a list of some local businesses and reach out to them for support, and encourage community members to think of ways they can contribute. After all, a community garden is about a lot more than just gardening.

Find a community of people

Start by talking to people you know - Ask your neighbors to talk to people they know; ask friends to spread the word. Create a free email account with the name of the neighborhood, so people can contact you without you needing to give out your personal information.

Identify neighborhood groups - (churches, neighborhood councils, PTAs) and attend their meetings to let them know what you’re doing and that you want them to be involved.

Make flyers - Put them up in key places in your neighborhood (coffee shops, intersections). Ask local businesses to inform their employees, and put up a flyer in their place of business.

Take flyers door to door - A personal invitation, even from someone you barely know, is a powerful way to get people involved.

Use social media - Create a Facebook page for the garden and encourage people to join and start the conversation there.

Organize the people

Community gardens are incredibly diverse, with different visions and purposes to suit diverse neighborhoods. There is no “right way” to do it, but there are some common issues that groups need to discuss and decide the answers to. The best way is to plan a meeting and discuss important questions face to face. Write down your answers to the questions and then circulate the document, so that all involved can see what's being planned for the garden. It’s crucial that as many people as possible feel included in this process.

Starter questions - While it’s tempting to dive into questions such as where the garden will be located and what it will look like, community groups are strongly encouraged to start with questions about how the garden will be organized. The answer to these questions will assist in making other determinations further down the road. Read a sample list of starter questions (pdf)

Best practices

There are no “right” answers to this: Each group will have different needs and resources. However, there are some practices that are critical for sustained success when working with community groups.

Shared leadership - Often, a strong leader is present who’s capable of doing much of what is needed and making many of the decisions. But when you invite people to be involved with a project such as a community garden, you need to invite them into leadership and decision-making processes, too, or they may get frustrated.

Sharing leadership can be challenging, but it’s vital for long-term success. Far too many gardens rely on the leadership of a single, committed individual, and these gardens may fail when that person gets tired or needs to attend to other responsibilities. Community gardens also represent an incredible amount of work, so sharing leadership will spread the work and responsibility around. Groups tend to make better decisions when they hear from multiple people, as well.

Transparent decision-making processes - There are many forms of decision-making processes that can work for community groups, but whichever you choose, it must be transparent. When participants feel like decisions are being made in secret, or in some other way that’s invisible or inaccessible to them, they may feel frustrated and withdraw from the project.

Conflict resolution procedures - Many groups come to a project such as a garden with excitement and positive feelings about getting to know neighbors, so it can be hard to imagine a time when conflict might arise around a decision. But successful community gardens represent thousands of small and large decisions, so it’s inevitable that at some point disagreement will emerge.

Having clearly defined conflict resolution procedures in place can greatly reduce the amount of stress and tension that occurs when a group does run into conflict. Many times these procedures won't be needed, but having them is good insurance that if a group does run into conflict, it won’t run the project off the road.

Design a garden

1. Define: purpose and management

Ensuring the long-term sustainability of a community garden requires more than just the nuts-and-bolts of vegetable production and soil management. As you get started with the garden planning process, it’s necessary to discuss the goals of the garden and plan for enough volunteer and/or financial support to help achieve those goals.

There are about as many good reasons for having a community garden as there are gardeners. For some, it’s a chance to meet their neighbors; others are excited about learning to garden; some gardeners want to create a green space to grow healthy food for their neighborhood.

Is the purpose of the community garden to strengthen the community? To maximize fruit and vegetable production? Is there a shared vision for what types of practices will be used to produce the food? Who will primarily be responsible for the day-to-day operations that the garden requires? These are important questions to address as the garden gets underway.

Your group of gardeners doesn’t have to agree on just one reason but a discussion should be held, as this will help with many of the design decisions. A garden whose purpose is to maximize the amount of fresh food delivered to the food bank will look very different from a garden designed to foster community interaction. Getting clarification early on in the process ensures the garden “governance” gets off on the right foot.

Another important aspect is the long-term sustainability of the garden. A project whose goals are only the immediate term may be designed differently than one that aims for a longer timeframe.

While many may be excited about the thought of fresh produce grown locally and communally, the reality is that garden projects require a lot of work. Preparing plans for who (or what groups) are responsible for what aspects of the garden is critical to do in advance. There will inevitably be hot summer days when no one is particularly excited about pulling weeds, or times when many people are busy or out of town and interest wanes. Successful community garden projects require careful consideration of these governance questions.

2. Community garden structures

One factor to consider in community gardens is the distinction between gardens that are set up more as individual plots or those that are organized more as communal spaces. Individual plots are areas that gardeners rent to do with as they choose. Many choose to grow food for home consumption, with excess given to food banks. Many gardens have at least a portion of their garden in individual plots, and some are entirely that way. Other gardens are designed to have a portion of the space cared for by the entire community. The group works together to maintain the communal plot and shares in the benefits.

Here are several different purposes for communal garden structures:

Herb garden
Flower garden
Orchard
Native plant garden
Gathering place
Children’s garden
Children’s play area
Demonstration garden
Community-run volunteer (take produce as you work model)
Whatever else you like!

3. Shared space, shared community

Why plan a communal space in a garden? This type of space can be important to the development of a sense of community within and around the garden. Research has shown that levels of connection and interaction tend to be higher in gardens that reserve some area for communal space. The space can be used for many different activities such as gardening for donation, planting of demonstration gardens, and holding classes or community events. But the key to success is to discuss short and long-term plans for finances and management and ensuring that day-to-day operations will be tended to before expanding into additional activities.

Find a site

There is a diversity of successful community garden sites. But the most important thing is that the site works for the community of gardeners who will manage it. Several important considerations need to be taken into account when choosing a site for a community garden. Some have to do with location, others with the landowner.

Location considerations

1. Visibility

It’s beneficial to have the garden in a clearly visible location. Some of the most successful gardens are situated in a place where the community naturally gathers. They can serve as community gathering areas. Tucking a garden out of the way, in places people would otherwise not go, can prevent a garden from being used by the community and recognized as an asset.

Visibility is also important for safety reasons. Locating the garden in a place where passersby can have “eyes” on the site may discourage unwanted behavior.

2. Access

In addition to being visible, the garden needs to be accessible to both gardeners and large vehicles such as delivery trucks. You might not be able to find a location with all of the following, but consider each:

Parking
Bus route availability
Accessibility for the disabled
Child friendliness/safety
Truck delivery (compost, hay bales, etc.)

3. Sun, wind and drainage

The vast majority of vegetables and fruits don’t do well without at least 6 to 8 hours of full sunlight daily. Look to the south for large buildings or trees that will shade the site. Some shade on the site can be a nice relief on hot summer days, but a very shady site will be a challenge for growing vegetables. Likewise, too much wind will stunt plant growth. Finally, does it look like your prospective garden will flood? Or is it on a steep slope where you’ll need to terrace the soil to prevent erosion?

4. Soil Quality

Good gardens start with the great soil! Urban soil is often compacted, full of weed seeds, and sometimes contaminated. Take a pick or shovel and pot-hole around your prospective site. Is the soil heavy clay, sandy, full of rocks, rubble, or trash? Is it dark with organic matter or does it look like the topsoil was long scraped off? (Read more about evaluating soil.) Become a historian and find out about the site history. Ask neighbors and check with the county tax assessor’s office to see if the site was primarily residential or formerly hosted businesses. Determine if nearby major industries might have shed pollutants on the site. For more information on soil contaminants, see the Discover Soils section on Soil Contaminants. While many urban soils can be rehabilitated, think carefully about what you’ll have to invest to bring the soil at your prospective site up to top production potential.

Landowner considerations

The other major consideration when choosing a site is the landowner. Different types of landowners present different benefits and challenges to the garden—both in initial development and long-term stability. While many landowners are potentially willing to host a community garden, the differences between them most often boil down to the differences between public landowners (such as a city) and private landowners (such as an individual, citizens' group, or an agency like a church). Read about Quebec's unique history of urban gardening here.

Some considerations that relate to the type of landowner include:

1. Permission and land tenure

In many cases, urban farmers and community gardeners will arrange to lease land from an individual landowner or city agencies. Approach the landowner with a brief proposal in a letter. If they reply favorably, meet to work out further details (from garden design to clean up at the project close) and finalize everything in writing. Individual landowners might be easier to negotiate with than city agencies with their bureaucracy, but municipalities might be willing to give you a longer lease. Ideally, you will secure at least 3 years on your new site. Land tenure will affect whether you want to plant fruit trees in the ground or in barrels, the amount of soil building and physical infrastructure you build, etc. Remember to consult neighbors and community groups. Regardless of whether they have official say (like a homeowners' association) good neighbors and local group relations will greatly increase your project’s success. If you want to consider buying vacant urban land either as an individual or community gardening group, be aware that loans for vacant land work differently than home loans. You could make owning land more affordable through partnerships with land trusts or reduce your tax liability by having your land designated as agricultural or open space. While ownership means a certain amount of stability (especially if you purchase the land outright at an auction), it also means full responsibility for things like utilities and insurance.

2. Water and other utilities

There are three costs related to water. The first is access to a water meter. This can be one of the largest upfront costs. A public agency may be better able to pay for installation of a water meter than a private citizens’ group.

The second cost is installing pipes to convey water from the meter to the garden’s location, and then throughout the garden. This can often be done for relatively low cost. Public agencies often have staff qualified to do this work, or private citizens can do it with volunteer labor, but it helps to have a skilled volunteer.

The third cost is the ongoing cost of the water. No matter who the landowner is, gardeners are usually held responsible for the cost of the water they use throughout a growing season.

Other utilities include electricity (handy for operating power tools and lights), trash or green waste (you might not compost everything yourself!) and possibly sewage if you intend to have on-site restrooms – important if your space will become a more developed community or youth center. Be sure to negotiate who will pay for what.

3. Insurance

Different types of landowners will have different requirements regarding insurance. If the owner is a public agency that’s used to insuring its public spaces, then treating the garden like a public space (and/or having gardeners sign a waiver) can often satisfy the agency's requirements. Churches or other land-owning non-profits are also familiar with the costs of insuring the land they own, and changes may not be necessary to turn parts of their land into a garden.

A private citizen, however, probably won’t want to buy additional insurance to let a group of gardeners use his or her land. In this case, it may be best to seek out a third party that would be willing to support the community garden by handling the insurance.

4. Access to resources

Different ownership structures may make you eligible for different resources to assist with building the garden. In general, it’s easier to access public dollars if the garden is on public land. Private dollars can be sought to develop a garden on either public or private land. Consider partnering with or forming a non-profit to take advantage of tax-exempt status for donations.

Build a garden

Assess your soil

The first step in building a garden is to assess your soil for possible contaminants.

Garden design

Gardens can include physical infrastructure, ranging from a simple shed for tools to raised beds, hoop houses, greenhouses, and cold frames. More involved infrastructure might include community gathering places, produce stands, and food preparation areas. Garden design links together this infrastructure to support your garden goals.

As you sketch out your design, think about the physical elements at your site. Consider the direction of sun and wind exposure. Will you have good access to water with your design? Factor in the influence of adjacent buildings and trees, as well as low-lying areas prone to flooding. You should also consider the proximity to the street and entrance.

Most likely, you want to organize everything around your primary goal of food production. But even the production area design will be dictated by your garden structure: Is it a community farm where everybody works the beds together, or do gardener work individual plots? In any case, locate the production beds in an area with good sun, lower wind exposure, and good water access.

Beds: to raise or not to raise?

As you design your production area, think about bed layout and whether or not to make raised beds. Raised beds can range from paths between soil mounds to shallow boxes resting on the native soil. They can even be boxes several feet tall physically separated from the native soil.

The type of raised bed you choose will be based on your native soil. If your soil is contaminated, consider raised boxes with imported soils. Or perhaps you have a weedy area in an uncultivated vacant lot. This soil may have a relatively high amount organic matter, and be ready for you to cultivate. Poor quality soil--soil with low organic matter that has been compacted by traffic or other factors and is full of weeds--will need rehabilitation. Think about the energy it will take to fix poor quality soil and the time you’ll be able to work at the site, in comparison to the money and labor it takes to build raised beds.

Here are some pros and cons about raised beds to help you with the decision:

Appearance - If the appearance of the garden is important (for example, it’s on a busy street corner or located on public property), consider building raised beds. Even if they are full of weeds, they have a more “tidy” look than in-ground gardens.
Ease of gardening/accessibility - If the soil in the garden is hard to work or several gardeners struggle to bend over, you may want to consider raised beds. Often the soil is easier to work, there are fewer weeds, and you can construct beds to be of a height that’s easier to work for gardeners with limited mobility.
Cost - The cost of raised beds makes a garden much more expensive to build. If cost is a limiting factor, you may want to consider amending the existing soil rather than bringing in the soil for a raised bed. You could also go with simple mounded beds with high-quality soil.
Existing soil quality - Sometimes soil in urban areas has been neglected and can take several growing seasons to rehabilitate. Importing soil from elsewhere can be a way to speed up the time to a productive vegetable garden. Make sure you import good quality, uncontaminated topsoil.
Reduced risk - In some areas of cities, soil contamination can be a factor. If you suspect high levels of heavy metals in your soil, build raised beds and mulch all surrounding soil to reduce your risk. Be sure to test raised bed soil after a few years, since even soil in raised beds can become contaminated by aerial fallout from local industries and chipping house paint.
Skilled labor - While they are not complicated structures, raised beds do require some construction skills. If your garden does not have volunteers with these skills, either reach out to the community for assistance or build your garden on the ground.
Water dynamics - Raised beds can dry out faster than native soil. Depending on your climate and local drainage, this can be a pro or a con.

Layout garden with pathways to success

Well-designed garden paths invite people into the garden and make moving materials easy. Plan paths and reasonably-sized garden beds so gardeners can access the bed without stepping directly on the soil. Over time, stepping directly on your bed soil compacts the soil. This leads to poor water infiltration, and issues with drainage and air flow–which impedes plant growth. Popular bed designs include three-foot wide rectangular beds, curving beds, and circular beds with keyhole paths for access. Leave plenty of pathway space in between for wheelbarrows, wheelchairs, and groups of people.

Pathways should be covered or mulched to protect from erosion and dust. You’ll need to consider the type of mulching material. If your garden is to be truly accessible, the paths should be paved with paving bricks. Paving bricks allow for good mobility and are permeable to allow rain and snowmelt to reach the soil underneath. Mulch paths with woodchips (often free from local arborists) to prevent weed growth and keep down dust, especially if the soil is contaminated.

This is also a great time to think about how you will water the garden. Rain with occasional sprinkler use? Drip irrigation? The right garden design can make watering easier, whether that means beds that are all the same size so they all take the same length of drip tape, beds that a sprinkler can easily cover, or a nice wide path for pulling the hose.

Other garden infrastructure

Sheds are indispensable for secure and dry tool storage. Check with your local building permits office to see if you need a permit to build a shed. In many cities, you can build a shed with a roof area less than 120 square feet without a permit.

Fences control access, so think carefully about who you want to feel welcomed to the garden. Fences can help you control when people have access to your garden and may provide some safety. Some research shows that community members feel most ownership over unfenced gardens, while in other areas community members prefer gardens to be fenced and closed overnight. Still, other experience shows that beautiful tomatoes and heads of broccoli might disappear regardless of the presence of fences. There are not always easy answers to these questions, but thinking carefully about your garden goals and how your garden fits into the surrounding community can help. Fencing might require a permit, sometimes depending on height--for example, if it is over five feet tall.

Of course, there are some things you don’t want to welcome in your garden. Controlling access of animals, whether deer, rabbits, gophers, turkeys, or geese, requires specialized fencing and possibly netting. In particular, fencing in poultry and duck areas to prevent predation from raccoons, hawks, and possums can be a bit of an art.

Greenhouses are extremely useful for starting seeds and extending your growing season. Again, check with your building permit office, but you will probably not need a permit for a small structure or a structure that is not considered permanent, like a hoop house or high tunnel over your beds. However, if you’re going to put up a larger hoop house, we suggest checking in with the neighbors first!

Food preparation areas and farm stands are great ways to celebrate the food you produce and share it with others. Produce and handwashing areas can be low-tech and simple to install. Be aware that anything involving food preparation invokes a host of food safety regulations. Check local regulations carefully to make sure you meet food safety and vending requirements. Some cities are enacting progressive regulations to make it easy to prepare and sell food produced in community gardens, but others have codes regulating this activity. It’s best to check with your local officials. Selling produce is often easier to do than selling value-added products, like pickles or jam. However, these value-added products can bring in more income and create more jobs.

Community gathering and education spaces at urban farms can be anything from meeting areas to amphitheaters to outdoor classrooms. Urban agriculture spaces can play an important role in building community, so consider including space for people to gather. This can be a simple picnic table for garden meetings and sharing food or a more developed area for community events.

Restrooms and handwashing stations are a good idea and required by the city as you add in food preparation areas and community gathering spaces. As always, municipal codes apply.

Overall, there are so many great ways to design your garden! You can start small and work up to bigger dreams. You might have noticed a common theme of city permitting in the above descriptions. Working with city regulations is not always easy, but fortunately, many cities are working to make the process easier for urban farmers and gardeners. If your city is not “up to speed,” consider getting involved in helping to write local legislation that works in favor of urban farmers and gardeners.

Learn more about keeping your raised beds healthy, and watch a video about soil compaction!

Amend the soil

Whether you're using existing soil, or importing soil to fill raised garden beds, soil amendments are a vital resource for ensuring a productive vegetable garden. Many neglected urban soils are compacted and low in organic matter. Soil amendments are designed to add organic material back into soil, reduce compaction, and improve soil life.

In many urban areas, municipalities are taking organic waste products from urban areas, and finding a new life for them in community gardens. Not only does this turn waste into a resource, it also improves urban soil, and gets urban residents to consider where their waste products go and the impacts of waste on the ecology of a city.

Some common soil amendments are:

Biosolids

Biosolids are the digested, solid portion extracted from the wastewater treatment process. They may not sound pretty—but there’s nothing better for creating an amazing garden. In addition to being 100% recycled and full of macro- and micro-nutrients, biosolids work to build healthy soil like nothing else.

Biosolids are also held to stringent standards by the Environmental Protection Agency and have been repeatedly shown to be a safe, effective way to build healthy soil. All municipalities are tasked with managing their own biosolids; the majority treat them to a level of cleanliness that’s safe for farmland (Class B), but not for the urban gardener. A small but growing number of cities, however, are investing in the technology to produce Class A biosolids—clean enough to distribute to those gardening in urban areas.

A good example of this is Tagro. The City of Tacoma, WA, invested in the late 1980s in a state-of-the-art treatment plant that creates the highest quality biosolids: Class A, or Exceptional Quality. Tagro, short for “Tacoma Grow,” has been available for gardening in Tacoma and surrounding Pierce County since 1991, and has a box of ribbons from the local Puyallup Fair to prove how well it works. Available throughout the Pacific Northwest, Tagro currently blends two different products: Tagro Mix and Tagro Potting soil.

Compost

Compost is organic material that has decomposed into a stable state that’s then available for adding to soil. Anything that was once alive can be composted; therefore different composts can vary in their properties. Some of the most common composts available to urban residents are made from the yard debris that is collected curb-side from residents.

Manure

Manure can give your garden an incredible boost in nutrients. Make sure the manure you use has been well aged or composted. Check with local agriculture organizations to see if they have a list of local farms willing to share their manure. Read our blog about manure use and food safety.

Using amendments

You can add amendments to soil anytime, but the best times for working it into an existing garden are in the spring before planting, and in the fall when putting the garden to bed.

It’s not complicated! Generally two to three inches of the amendment is sufficient. Just spread it around the garden, and then either mix it into the soil with a shovel or use a small tiller.