In defence of urban community gardens
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 19583277 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Monika Egerer (0000-0002-3304-0725, Technical University of Munich, corresponding author), Susan Karlebowski (0009-0008-8335-4723, Museum für Naturkunde), Felix Conitz (0000-0002-9860-0754, Technical University of Munich), Astrid E Neumann (0000-0002-1736-3946, Technical University of Munich), Julia M Schmack (0000-0001-7153-1763, Technical University of Munich), Ulrike Sturm (0000-0001-6446-6051, Museum für Naturkunde) |
| Year | 2024 |
| Volume | 6 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 367-376 |
| Publication date | 2024-04-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | People and Nature (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 2575-8314 • E-ISSN: 2575-8314 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1002/pan3.10612 |
| OpenAlex | W4391968776 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 9 |
| References cited | 57 |
With the boom in urban living has come a boom in urban gardening. In particular, urban community gardening is an increasingly popular form of horticultural production, community involvement and connection to nature. Through the establishment and management of community gardens, biodiversity can flourish, with community gardens as ‘hotspots’ of flora and fauna within the urban matrix. Gardeners can deeply connect with the natural elements of gardens and thus learn about and gain appreciation for the natural world. Such interactions can combat the loss of nature experiences in cities. Despite their benefits for nature and for people, community gardens are threatened ecosystems as often temporary fixtures in city landscapes due to lack of land tenure and policy protection. In this perspective, we recognize community gardens as an important ecosystem in urban conservation and argue for the defence of urban community gardens by city policy. We formalize this activity and the value of these ecosystems with scientific evidence from ecological and social‐ecological research in 39 community gardens in Berlin and Munich, Germany. Although our data reveal that these gardens support large amounts of biodiversity and catalyse human‐nature connections, a lack of comprehensive documentation of social‐ecological benefits at the city level can make community gardens vulnerable to urban planning threats; we have seen losses of multiple research sites in the last 4 years of biodiversity research. Policy implications : To protect community gardens now and for future urban generations, we call for systematic and comprehensive data collection on community gardening activities and policy support for these urban ecosystems. Some cities are starting to do this and this can be scaled out. We argue for the recognition of urban community gardens as a physical land use and also of the gardeners themselves as important habitat managers and stewards of urban biodiversity. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog
Biodiversity · Documentation · Environmental planning · Environmental resource management · Geography · Threatened species · Urban ecosystem · Urban planning · Land Use and Ecosystem Services · Urban Agriculture and Sustainability · Urban Green Space and Health · Ecology
Beneath the surface
Social and ecological factors on the perception of cultural ecosystem services and disservices
Synergising outdoor, indoor, and greenhouse urban agriculture to strengthen urban resilience in an era of polycrisis
Living labs
Drivers of People’s Connectedness with Nature in Urban Areas
Improvement of the General Resilience of Social–Ecological Systems on an Urban Scale Through the Strategic Location of Urban Community Gardens
Urban oases and spatial injustices
Do fences divide perception? A study of community garden benefits among users and non-users in Czech cities
The role of urban community gardens in the food system in Brisbane, Australia
The Urban Experience
Global Urbanization and the Separation of Humans from Nature
Gardening is beneficial for health
Extinction of experience
Fruit and Vegetable Intake among Urban Community Gardeners
Supplying urban ecosystem services through multifunctional green infrastructure in the United States
Growing urban health
Childhood nature connection and constructive hope
Capital
Where birds felt louder
Global synthesis reveals heterogeneous changes in connection of humans to nature
Visible Garden Biodiversity Is Associated with Noticing Nature and Nature Connectedness
You feel like you’re part of something bigger”
The impact of urban gardens on adequate and healthy food
Urban conservation gardening in the decade of restoration
Stacking functions
Results of a US and Canada community garden survey
Cultivating Just Planning and Legal Institutions
Conflicting rights to the city in New York's community gardens
Incommensurability, Land Use, and the Right to Space
The loss of land devoted to allotment gardening
Capitalist Formations of Enclosure
Cities and the Geographies of “Actually Existing Neoliberalism”
Gated gardens
Seeds for Change? Attaining the benefits of community gardens through council policies in Sydney, Australia
Community Gardening and Community Development
Radical, reformist, and garden-variety neoliberal
Central Park against the streets
| Unique citing works | 9 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 9 |
| Citation span | 2025 - 2026 (2) |
| Citation velocity | current |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 8 |