Interesting questions. I have no data, just some ideas. Will the residents have any space at all to garden around their homes, or is the community space the only option for gardening?
I wonder if the local master-gardener program might have an idea about the popularity of gardening, or the level of interest. If I were setting aside land for a garden, I'd set aside as much as possible. I'd expect the demand to increase over the years, as residents see what other people are growing and want to join in. Beginning gardeners can handle small plots. As they get more experience, some gardeners want a lot more space to grow all the seeds they've ordered! If this is a new development, it might help to get an idea of who might be buying in. What kinds of jobs? (If all the adults have a long commute and demanding jobs, then at best they'll be gardening only on weekends, assuming they're not working on the weekends, too.) Lots of small children? At one of the community gardens I belong to, every time a family with small children gets a plot, they're really enthusiastic the first year (or the first month), and then they never come back -- no time. But once the kids are big enough to handle tools, committed families do stick around. So if there are lots of families with small kids, smaller plots might be more popular. On the other hand, if you get a few avid gardeners, they'll enjoy having big plots and will share their bounty. So the best strategy is to have plots of different sizes, from 4x8 to 20x20 or more. It's nice to have fruit trees and a few herb beds for everyone to share. Sometimes the fruit gets picked by one or a few people (or by the roof rats and squirrels!), though. I even know one garden that has a "food forest" of perennial edibles. A picnic table and some chairs will encourage people to stick around, enhancing the "community" part. Some sort of shade structure (tree, pergola, etc.) is nice, too. One hose bib per plot is ideal, but it's possible to have fewer. Communal hoses tend to get trashed, though -- everyone coils them differently and they get kinks and then leaks. If you're in a dry-summer climate, it might be cost-effective in the long run if you offer drip irrigation, or promote it. Fences and gates are essential, even if they are merely symbolic. Gardeners don't want dogs and cats wandering through. The fence and gate mostly mark the boundary. You can post notices to/among gardeners on the fence or on a kiosk near the gate. A community garden is a great place for people to walk, and visiting (without picking) should be encouraged. For dog walkers, a perimeter path is ideal. Having lots of foot traffic cuts down on any vandalism or stealing, too. It's essential to have a place for composting (or bins for the city to pick up) and a wide service gate there. It's also nice to have a place where truckloads of compost or mulch can be dumped for gardeners to use, again with a wide service gate, on a road accessible to trucks. Some gardeners will want to have their own compost bins, but many will want a place to put old tomato vines and sunflower stalks at the end of the season. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://list.communitygarden.org/pipermail/community_garden_list.communitygarden.org/attachments/20131001/dcf6e29b/attachment.html> _______________________________________________ The American Community Gardening Association listserve is only one of ACGA's services to community gardeners. To learn more about the ACGA and to find out how to join, please go to http://www.communitygarden.org To post an e-mail to the list: [email protected] To subscribe, unsubscribe or change your subscription: http://list.communitygarden.org/mailman/listinfo/community_garden_list.communitygarden.org
