Details
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 128206 |
| Journal | Urban Forestry and Urban Greening |
| Volume | 92 |
| Publication status | Published - Feb 2024 |
| Externally published | Yes |
Abstract
Community gardens are growing in popularity worldwide, especially in densely populated urban areas. They provide semi-public spaces for joint gardening activities and serve as social and ecological retreats. The COVID-19 pandemic and associated restrictions in movement and leisure activities led to a changed demand for urban green spaces, but it remains unclear how it affected the overall trend in demand for community gardens. We measured interest to participate in community gardening between 2018 and 2022 based on a combination of counted application numbers and qualitative responses from garden coordinators. Out of 373 contacted community gardens, 70 replied, distributed across 43 cities in Switzerland, Germany, UK, USA, Canada and New Zealand. We find an increase in demand for participation in community gardens from 2018 to 2022, both based on counted application numbers and memory-based interest in participation. A generalized linear mixed model shows significant increases in applications from 2018 to 2019 (19 %), 2020 to 2021 (25 %) and 2021 to 2022 (16 %), but not from 2019 to 2020 (−0.32 %). These results confirm an ongoing trend of increasing demand for community gardens, with momentary reduced activity during 2020 due to COVID-19 restrictions, followed by a subsequent surge in demand. The peak increase in application numbers in 2021, along with the overall rise from 2018 to 2022, underscores the crucial role of community gardens in an urbanizing world, especially during challenging times. It is essential for urban planners to prioritize meeting this increasing demand as part of their efforts to make cities more sustainable.
Keywords
- Coronavirus, Ecosystem services, Greenspace, Health, Sustainable development, Urban planning, Wellbeing
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Agricultural and Biological Sciences(all)
- Forestry
- Environmental Science(all)
- Ecology
- Agricultural and Biological Sciences(all)
- Soil Science
Sustainable Development Goals
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In: Urban Forestry and Urban Greening, Vol. 92, 128206, 02.2024.
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › Research › peer review
}
TY - JOUR
T1 - Increasing demand for urban community gardening before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic
AU - Bieri, Dominik
AU - Joshi, Neelakshi
AU - Wende, Wolfgang
AU - Kleinschroth, Fritz
N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2024 The Authors
PY - 2024/2
Y1 - 2024/2
N2 - Community gardens are growing in popularity worldwide, especially in densely populated urban areas. They provide semi-public spaces for joint gardening activities and serve as social and ecological retreats. The COVID-19 pandemic and associated restrictions in movement and leisure activities led to a changed demand for urban green spaces, but it remains unclear how it affected the overall trend in demand for community gardens. We measured interest to participate in community gardening between 2018 and 2022 based on a combination of counted application numbers and qualitative responses from garden coordinators. Out of 373 contacted community gardens, 70 replied, distributed across 43 cities in Switzerland, Germany, UK, USA, Canada and New Zealand. We find an increase in demand for participation in community gardens from 2018 to 2022, both based on counted application numbers and memory-based interest in participation. A generalized linear mixed model shows significant increases in applications from 2018 to 2019 (19 %), 2020 to 2021 (25 %) and 2021 to 2022 (16 %), but not from 2019 to 2020 (−0.32 %). These results confirm an ongoing trend of increasing demand for community gardens, with momentary reduced activity during 2020 due to COVID-19 restrictions, followed by a subsequent surge in demand. The peak increase in application numbers in 2021, along with the overall rise from 2018 to 2022, underscores the crucial role of community gardens in an urbanizing world, especially during challenging times. It is essential for urban planners to prioritize meeting this increasing demand as part of their efforts to make cities more sustainable.
AB - Community gardens are growing in popularity worldwide, especially in densely populated urban areas. They provide semi-public spaces for joint gardening activities and serve as social and ecological retreats. The COVID-19 pandemic and associated restrictions in movement and leisure activities led to a changed demand for urban green spaces, but it remains unclear how it affected the overall trend in demand for community gardens. We measured interest to participate in community gardening between 2018 and 2022 based on a combination of counted application numbers and qualitative responses from garden coordinators. Out of 373 contacted community gardens, 70 replied, distributed across 43 cities in Switzerland, Germany, UK, USA, Canada and New Zealand. We find an increase in demand for participation in community gardens from 2018 to 2022, both based on counted application numbers and memory-based interest in participation. A generalized linear mixed model shows significant increases in applications from 2018 to 2019 (19 %), 2020 to 2021 (25 %) and 2021 to 2022 (16 %), but not from 2019 to 2020 (−0.32 %). These results confirm an ongoing trend of increasing demand for community gardens, with momentary reduced activity during 2020 due to COVID-19 restrictions, followed by a subsequent surge in demand. The peak increase in application numbers in 2021, along with the overall rise from 2018 to 2022, underscores the crucial role of community gardens in an urbanizing world, especially during challenging times. It is essential for urban planners to prioritize meeting this increasing demand as part of their efforts to make cities more sustainable.
KW - Coronavirus
KW - Ecosystem services
KW - Greenspace
KW - Health
KW - Sustainable development
KW - Urban planning
KW - Wellbeing
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85182585571&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.ufug.2024.128206
DO - 10.1016/j.ufug.2024.128206
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85182585571
VL - 92
JO - Urban Forestry and Urban Greening
JF - Urban Forestry and Urban Greening
SN - 1618-8667
M1 - 128206
ER -